Culture of Life Religious News

Bush Orders Homeland Security To Open Religious Center

2006-03-08T21:32:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Bush continues to violate the Constitution, this time unilaterally creating a "religious center" at Homeland Security, the neo-nazi police state aparatus. The first five Amendments are the most important and were put in the Constitution by our Founding Fathers themselves for good reasons.

From the Washington Post:

President Bush ordered the Department of Homeland Security yesterday to create a center for faith-based and community initiatives within 45 days to eliminate regulatory, contracting and programmatic barriers to providing federal funds to religious groups to deliver social services, the White House announced last night.

Pressed both by churches that have not received privately raised Hurricane Katrina relief funds as promised and by the outpouring of help of religious groups to Gulf Coast storm victims, Bush also called on the department by September "to identify all existing barriers . . . that unlawfully discriminate against, or otherwise discourage or disadvantage the participation" of such groups in federal programs.

The reason why those churches didn't get lots of loot is because they are not taxed so they can do charity. If they are "for profit" then they better put themselves under our control and this means no preaching because of the Constitutional wall between church and state. You want to preach then you can't be on the government payroll.

Lots of Americans selflessly opened their purses for the victims of the hurricanes. Not one of them got a penny back from the government. They could, if they were in the right tax brackets, get a tax break but that was all they got.

Bush secretly and illegally promised the mega churches and various right wing churches that they could pretend to be donating services (no money, just their buildings, etc) and the government would pay them as if they were businesses and they could still prosyletize their victims! This was squelched and now they are ticked off at him and he needs their bovine support for his wars and misadventures such as handing America over to foreign powers. Also, to keep Congress within striking range of stealing elections with the thinnest of majorities via rigged voting machines, he has to have at least 35% of the population beholden to him.

Not content with unleashing a very vicious and violent religious civil war in Iraq, this crazy man is trying to do the same here in America. The Republicans will go down in history as the party that betrayed America and burned both the flag and Constitution. The invisible fires are rapidly eating away at the very fabric of our democracy. As Russia pointed out just this week.

*************************************************************
Previous Similar Articles
*************************************************************
To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Rachel Corrie Play Censored In NYC Due Pressure From Religious Bigots

2006-03-03T23:19:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

A hit London play about IDF victim, Rachel Corrie, was cancelled indefinitely in NYC due to pressure from religious bigots who are terrified that Americans might get the truth about her murder despite the media wall that prevented her story from being seen here in America. I saw the video of how she was murdered and it was obvious, the driver of the bulldozer saw her and maliciously ran her over. Time for the NYT which lied about this to come clean not to mention, the other media!

From Common Dreams:

The Flights for cast and crew had been booked; the production schedule delivered; there were tickets advertised on the Internet. The Royal Court Theatre production of "My Name Is Rachel Corrie," the play I co-edited with Alan Rickman, was transferring later this month to the New York Theatre Workshop, home of the musical "Rent," following two sold-out runs in London and several awards.

We always felt passionately that it was a piece of work that needed to be seen in the United States. Created from the journals and e-mails of American activist Rachel Corrie, telling of her journey from her adolescence in Olympia, Wash., to her death under an Israeli bulldozer in Gaza at the age of 23, we considered it a unique American story that would have a particular relevance for audiences in Rachel's home country. After all, she had made her journey to the Middle East in order "to meet the people who are on the receiving end of our [American] tax dollars," and she was killed by a U.S.-made bulldozer while protesting the demolition of Palestinian homes.

But last week the New York Theatre Workshop canceled the production — or, in its words, "postponed it indefinitely." The political climate, we were told, had changed dramatically since the play was booked. As James Nicola, the theater's 's artistic director, said Monday, "Listening in our communities in New York, what we heard was that after Ariel Sharon's illness and the election of Hamas in the recent Palestinian elections, we had a very edgy situation." Three years after being silenced for good, Rachel was to be censored for political reasons."

This story was from the LA Times. The NYT also had a tiny article at the bottom of a series of other announcements. The reporter wasn't very curious about the cancellation and didn't dig very deeply into who was pressuring the theater to cancel and the silliness that Sharon, a living corpse, would be disturbed by the revelation that he was the director of a military operation bent on murder, like hahaha. This butcher loved massacres.

In the news, this item was mentioned only 18 times according to Google. Many times, in regular news stories, you get at least 300 entries. In this case, a few major outlets mentioned the news but most didn't do anything beyond the barest information and none examined the original story which was, the IDF was trying to intimidate foreigners who were standing up the brutalization of Palestinians and one of them, Rachel, was maliciously and obviously run over and I saw it, the bulldozer driver even ground the blade into her, backing up very slowly while people screamed and screamed at him, I had to cover my ears!

Then he was let off the hook like all the IDF murderers, citing "accidental" killing which was an obvious lie.

Like the video of Bush laughing while reading "My Pet Goat" after hearing the news that the terrorist attack he desperately wanted succeeded, this video has never been shown to America except for Michael Moore's film, "Farenheit 911" which the media screamed was filled with lies and desperate moves were made to hide it or belittle it. So it was with poor Rachel Corrie. Now, even a simple play based on her emails, can't appear in public in NYC because this might alert people to the true facts of her case and that is verboten.

I hate this with a passion. There are many moves afoot to follow the hideous path chosen by Zionists, the desire to turn various places into religious dictatorships, what I call, "Religious Fascism", this monster is devouring billions of people. Here is a typical example here in America: Missouri Bill To Make Christianity Official Religion:

Missouri legislators in Jefferson City considered a bill that would name Christianity the state's official "majority" religion.

House Concurrent Resolution 13 has is pending in the state legislature.

Many Missouri residents had not heard about the bill until Thursday.

Karen Aroesty of the Anti-defamation league, along with other watch-groups, began a letter writing and email campaign to stop the resolution.

The resolution would recognize "a Christian god," and it would not protect minority religions, but "protect the majority's right to express their religious beliefs.

The Anti-defamation League is worried this will be used to attack Jews. Well, duh! Alas, they can't see this when Jews attack other religions or other people, when they impose religious bigottry on other nations! In Europe, people are being put in prison because they hold beliefs the states don't want such as the Holocaust deniers. This is giving obvious Nazis the status of victims of persecution and increasingly, people chafe at the hamfisted efforts to control debate about history, this is totally wrong. One wins these debates by arguing facts, not mugging the other side and then gagging it.

The Missouri bill is typical of many religious bills being considered across America in places where support for shipping all the Jews to Israel is very strong. These people, and I know them well!---dream of creating a New Jerusalem in America, one that is this nightmare religious bigot state that is only for Christians! And they use the political positions and excuses Zionists cooked up for creating their slave state in the Holy Land. For everyone is a slave to the Jews there and here, everyone will be slaves of the right wing Christians who want no secular protections for those of us who are not right wing Christian Nazis! They want to drive us out, too, to die.

The entire underpinning of the Jews only state is a poison in this world, many radical Muslims embrace this ideology and feel justified in persecuting minority religions because their vicious neighbors are doing exactly that while celebrating tribal/religous bigot lifestyles as the ultimate way humanity should live!

This disgusting ideology is the latest branch of fascism to grow on blood soaked soil and it is a mere twig compared to the nasty tree of the same that many are trying to plant here. The ten Amendments to the Constitution are, I believe, universal. All nations should have it as their bedrock, even in the Middle East: seperation of Church and State and freedom of speech being the top two items! As an America citizen, I am proud of this Constitution and angry that the top provisions in the Amendments are being destroyed thanks to various religious factions desperately trying to build extra-legal entities that allow them to bully and abuse other humans.

I don't care what religion it is, this has to stop, now!

A Colorado Teacher is Censored:

About 150 high school students walked out of class to protest a decision to put a teacher on leave while they investigate remarks he made about President Bush in class, including that some people compare Bush to Adolf Hitler.

The protest came Thursday as administrators began investigating whether Overland High School teacher Jay Bennish violated a policy requiring balancing viewpoints in the classroom, Cherry Creek School District spokeswoman Tustin Amole said.

The joke online is, Bush can't be compared to Hitler, after all, Hitler actually was in the midst of battle and got wounded and he was good at giving speeches and no one pulled his strings. Bush is more like Henry the VI, ineffectual and bumbling.

Again and again, people are censored because we aren't supposed to talk about fascism and the meaning of fascists and worrying about creeping fascism. Many Jewish people want to isolate the issue, pretending it was only a Hitler thing rather than understanding its true nature and roots and why it is thriving today.

Here is a quote from the head of the theater group who cancelled the play:

“The uniform answer we got was that the fantasy that we could present the work of this writer simply as a work of art without appearing to take a position was just that, a fantasy,” Nicola was quoted saying in The New York Times The play was a hit at the Royal Court Theater in London last year."

Lord forbid that people not look at a bloody murder as a bloody murder. We have to appreciate it as mere esthetics, first!

Gah. Murder should outrage us and horrify us! 'The Passion of Christ" is a hideous movie because it looks at the Bibical descriptions of the Roman execution of a Jewish dissident and the film maker had to make up all sorts of salacious details that were not in any record, all aimed at getting people aroused with the macabre theatrical bloody events, in the case of the Corrie play, the bloody end was barely visible, it focused on the girl, herself, a clear counterpart to another girl whose life was snuffed by fascists, Anne Frank.

The Electronic Infantata wants to do some protests concerning this censorship of Rachel's life.

Please endorse this initiative, and join this coalition. It's not meant to replace any plans that groups may already have for March 16th or individual responses to the cancellation of the play (expressing feelings to the NYTW, writing op-eds, etc.) but to support them. In fact, we are hoping that a unified action, world-wide, and with press coverage will ensure that Rachel's words are heard more widely than ever and, through her words, her message of human rights and justice will be heard as well. If you already have an event planned for March 16, perhaps reading from Rachel's e-mails can be incorporated into or before/after your event. Groups and individuals can sign on.

I hope this will force a retraction of the censorship and Americans can finally see what the rest of Europe can see so freely.

Free speech for everyone! Even fascists.

*************************************************************
Previous Similar Articles
*************************************************************
To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Iraq Erupts In Religious Frenzy Killing--Sadr Very Pleased

2006-02-22T14:50:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

As expected, the demolition of the mosque in Samarra has triggered a wave of tremendous violence across Iraq as Shia (Shiites) blame Sunnis. We have no idea who did it but the people were wearing Secret Police Commandos' uniforms and masks.

From the NY Times:

Religious leaders called for restraint after the attack on the golden-domed shrine, located in the volatile town of Samarra. The shrine housed the tombs of two revered leaders of Shiite Islam and symbolized the place where the Imam Mahdi, a mythical, messianic figure, disappeared from this earth. Believers in the imam say he will return when the apocalypse is near, to cleanse the world of its evils.

Sunni Arab politicians said that more than 25 Sunni mosques across Iraq had been attacked in retaliation, although there was no independent confirmation of the number.

The blast in Samarra took place at about 7 a.m. and shook the city, a Sunni-dominated area that is nevertheless sacred to Shiites. The gunmen entered the shrine and handcuffed guards in the building, then set about planting the explosives, an official of the provincial governorate said. There were no immediate reports of casualties, but the golden dome was entirely destroyed, as well as three-quarters of the structure.

The earliest stories think Sunnis wearing fake uniforms did this but what if the uniforms were what Sadr's guys were wearing? They are the ones who had easy access to these garments and they knew the code words and they had handcuffs, etc.

In Baghdad, the American ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, said in a televised statement that the attack on the shrine was a "heinous crime" deliberately intended to foment strife, and that the United States would help to rebuild the structure.

The bombing of the shrine in Samarra came after two days of vicious bloodshed and political turmoil. A marketplace bombing in Baghdad and other attacks on Tuesday that killed 28 people, and violence on Monday that killed at least 26 people, signaled that a period of relative calm during political talks had come to an abrupt end.

The Sunni didn't want to end the talks. The American rulers wanted the talks to continue so the Sunni could get some political power. So the list of who wanted these talks to end quickly are very short. At the top of the list is Sadr.

Once again, the idea of the Apocalypse pops up. People want this to happen. Millions of Muslims, millions of Christians and quite a few other religions. This mental disorder is very powerful, very potent and very violent. They don't plan for a future because there is, by definition, no future.

As Babylon burns as it blows up and as it writhes, our government rituallistically says they will rebuild it all yet we can't rebuild squat since we are going bankrupt and aside from that, anything built will be destroyed. The palaces we refitted, for example, were handed over the the Shiite run govenment and within hours was totally looted and stand now as ruins.

Here is some more damning information leading me to suspect the bombers are not Sunni: From Associated Press:

Khalilzad has urged the Iraqis to form a unity government in which nonsectarian figures control the ministries of Defense, which runs the army, and Interior, which is responsible for the police.

The current interior minister, Bayan Jabr, is a member of al-Hakim's party. His commandos have been accused by Sunni Arabs of widespread human rights abuses against Sunni civilians.

Both Sadr and he are yelling that no one can protect the Shia from attacks except themselves. So they want to be able to terrorize the Sunni, they want control of the vital military/police forces. They also want the Americans to leave pretty soon since they feel they can do whatever they want and you know this will be some sort of ugly bloodbath.

Here is the Tower of Babel which western artists used as their model for many centuries. It is also in Samarra.
The people of many nations, many religions, have poured into Babylon this last three years, speaking many languages, precious little communication going on, they have set to quarrelling. From the Bible:

1 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As men moved eastward, [a] they found a plain in Shinar [b] and settled there.
3 They said to each other, "Come, let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly." They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. 4 Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth."

5 But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. 6 The LORD said, "If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other."

8 So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why it was called Babel [c] —because there the LORD confused the language of the whole world. From there the LORD scattered them over the face of the whole earth.

Maybe 1% of our troops and diplomats and operatives in Iraq speak any of the languages spoken there. And even within the language, the religious divisions are tremendous and growing thanks to Americans using violence to create a liberal state.

Of course, we had no intention of liberality, we wanted only to have a fake front liberalism while screaming at liberals at home, Bush and his gang would turn around and smile and tell the Muslims they wanted civil rights for women and freedom of speech and religion and then they would do the opposite here at home and there in Iraq. So things go from bad to worse thanks to insincere and downright evil intentions.

The screamfest at the stalwart Palestinians are beginning to backfire. America is again, losing huge status playing the bully boy for Israel. Then we go to Iraq to mediate between rival religions that have hated each other for literally 1,000 years.

The religious riots are spreading like wildfire. From the BBC:

Christian mobs rampaged through the city attacking Muslims in retaliation for anti-Christian riots in the north.

"Thousands of people who have been displaced from their homes are now sheltered at the police and army barracks," the official said.

Earlier on Tuesday, the authorities in Bauchi in northern Nigerian imposed a curfew after at least 13 people were killed in a sectarian riot.

The Bauchi riot followed violence over the weekend in the two northern towns of Maiduguri and Katsina, which began as demonstrations against the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.

More than 10,000 people died in communal violence across the country in the first few years following Nigeria's return to democratic rule in 1999, but in recent months these clashes have less frequent.

Another state we are deep inside, meddling in bad ways, is Nigeria. We are demanding the rebels release the kidnapped oil workers and surrender to us so we can pump all the oil without paying them hardly anything for it.

Meanwhile, at home, many Gulf War I vets are dying from Depleted Uranium. From Rense.com:

In the article Arthur Bernklau, executive director of Veterans for Constitutional Law, reportedly wrote that "thousands of our military have suffered and died from, [and depleted uranium] has finally been identified as the cause of this sickness, eliminating the guessing. The terrible truth is now being revealed." Bernklau went on to detail several alarming statistics. The historical disability rate amongst soldiers last century was about 5 percent, although it approached 10 percent during Vietnam. But due to the use of depleted uranium in the battlefield, 56 percent of the 580,400 solders that served in the first Gulf War were on Permanent Medical Disability by 2000. 11,000 Gulf War veterans are already dead. Now 518,739 Gulf War Veterans, almost all of them, are currently on medical disability.

This is all so sad. Aside from them dying, their children are being born with all sorts of illnesses and genetic defects. We made a deal with the devil to win no matter what so we ended up using the devil's tools, lying to ourselves that this is all for the good.

Things are going to get worse, alas. No one is willing to let go of anyone's throats so all will attempt to strangle each other. and remember, whoever is orchestrating things loves magic numbers and the big, big magic number of them all is 6/6/6. Namely, the beginning of June, this year.

Can't wait.

*************************************************************
Previous Similar Articles
*************************************************************
To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Mourning the Death of Beloved Children

2006-01-19T13:43:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

I can't say that I know how it feels to lose a beloved child, I can only call upon that wonderful gift given to us by the Goddesses, to feel sympathy when I hear of people losing the dearest part of themselves. One of our readers has sustained such a great loss, and I want him to know, we care.

I learned this from an email from another reader. Since he has been private about this, I won't say who it is, only please remember, everyone, we come onto this lovely planet and we live, and love and loving is all there really is that you can carry beyond the Gates of Death. There is nothing else, not anything, just love, and love is all there really is, deep inside, it is what keeps us not only alive but living, not entombed in eternal death but alive, to feel, for feeling love is what our souls are, they can only exist when there is love and love is everything and the end of everything.

Readers of this blog can probably guess that I am not an atheist. I have very strong beliefs based on my own life experiences. When I was a child, I died for a short while. Passing through the Gates of Death, I learned many things very suddenly, I learned that up is down and in is out and heavy is light and light is dark. And where all these things merge is where I was going and I was afraid.

And out of the chaos came a bolt of white light like a comet, it was Pegasus. I grabbed hold and he flew out of there and I fell to the ground in real time and space to see my father's tears streaming down his face and splashing onto mine.

Eventually, my parents will go where I went and all I can do is stand on the other shore and remember them for remembering is also love and love is what remains when all else is gone. Each day we live, we shower this love with our tears and this causes green things to grow and life springs ever eternal, even when it doesn't, it still is there, forever, for beyond the Gates of Death, there is no Time.

I have touched souls as they pass by, going there. It is like touching a rainbow, shimmering light as delicate as the Evening Star of Venus or the wash of light from the Milky Way in summer. So behold, this, and remember, it all comes together again, eventually, for all of us. We can't tell how or why, it just is, this stream of light, this effervesant river of love, always, in eternal embrace, the greatest force of all in the universe.

Peace to everyone.

Thank you.
*************************************************************
Previous Similar Articles
Strange Children, Lightning and Death
The Birth of Pegasus
The First Summer Storm
*************************************************************
To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Detriot's Bishop Announces He Was Molested By Priest Many Years Ago

2006-01-11T11:48:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Now a Bishop (!) says he was molested by a priest many years ago and he asks for Michigan to have no time limit on sexual abuse investigations. Meanwhile, the Ratzi Pope acts as if he is running a joy house. Dressing flashy and egging people on, exactly as I expected of him. Sex is a mysterious force, isn't it?

Fromt the Washington Post:

Breaking ranks with his peers, a Roman Catholic bishop called yesterday for state legislatures to temporarily remove the time limits that have prevented many victims of sex abuse from suing the church.

In making that extraordinary appeal, Auxiliary Bishop Thomas Gumbleton of Detroit also unburdened himself of a secret. As a teenager 60 years ago, he said, he was "inappropriately touched" by a priest.

This is rather unprecedented. The new Pope persuaded the previous one to not investigate sex abusing priests. More, Ratzi himself, squirreled away top Church sex offenders, often taking them out of the countries where they abused people and hiding them in the Vatican where they all are on a 24/7 party binge we can't really see, it all being hidden. But the fact is, this Pope, unlike the last one, loves to dress in hot style, lots of red and gold, of course, and he is grinning ear to ear as he pumps his ego up, he is like a one man gay power parade float only like so many sex fiends, he attacks gays who want civil rights and he attacks gays who want to dress in silk, lace, fancy embroideries like him, he attacks gays who want to live with their own loves even as he, himself, lives in a giant palace filled to the gills with only men, seriously, the contridictions of the Catholic Church are on full display just as the same thing is running amok in the American born again scene!

Every day in America, we have news stories of insane right wing religious nuts doing the nuttiest sexual escapades. At Atrios, he and his many readers have started a whole line of blog postings called "Bobo's World" to detail this stuff because the New York Times has this clown called Mr. Brooks who wrote a book about "Bohemians in the Garden of Eden" and we mock him for his superficial take on the maloderous mangled mess of the average right wing sex-suppression psychopaths.

Dr. Freud was part of a whole movement of intellects in Europe who tried to riddle out the mysteries of religion and sex and the human psyche back at the turn of the century as the Romantic Movement reached its greatest heights. Artists and musicians and writers churned up a lot of material and then the anthropologists, exploring the "primitive" tribes the European imperialist conquests encountered, all this allowed philosophers to openly discuss sex and religion.

More, archeologists and the discovery of all the Ice Age cave art opened yet more doors onto the darker, most tangled parts of the human mind and how it has created religion to deal with several important terrors of all humans: birth, death and the cosmos.

Unlike most animals, we have large enough brains that have a vast sector of hidden thought processes, that we can spend an awful lot of time wondering about life and death and imagining our own death all too vividly. Once we reached the top of the predator food chain, we won the luxury of deep sleep with vivid dreams since we fear little interference while knocked out.

The Gods we fear were unleashed in these dreams and unlike dogs or cats, our fellow friend-predators, who also dream, our dreams are much more complex due to the acquisition of language.

My most important dreams have been about the intersection of language and image.

The need to understand our rampant sexual urges has occupied our minds for eons. This is because it is fun thinking about sex and everyone wants to think about it but if we think about it too much and do it too much, we fall into ruin since it causes a cascade of social problems such as hunting, defending territory, controlling pregnancy frequency, building things, chipping rocks to make tools, making pottery, etc.

So the human mind, ever creative, took the sexual urge and redirected it into these desirable but non-reproductive activities. Singing special songs while chipping spear points, telling stories about other beings who happen to have sex, too, was a happy diversion because one could tend the fire or make pottery or hunt for fruits while being entertained without doing the act itself.

This displacement of the rampant sexual urges caused by human females no longer having a "heat" period like say, deer or horses, made social life in a tribe easier. A female could do various tasks during the day without being jumped. The taboos and restrictions were found to make sex much more interesting since the human mind could secretly plot how and when and where to do it and the intensification of sexual pleasure the thoughts gave was noticed probably way back by the earliest stone age peoples.

All this has gone through so much mediation and layering as each generation adds or subtracts elements in order to give life more pleasure or meaning or as various cultures struggle to deal with the manifest contridictions of sexual gratification problems, the whole dark mess has become both more obvious and more obscure, namely, we know now a great deal about the sexual roots of our pesky brains but we cannot accecpt the end results: namely, the more we control or express our sexual natures, the more it becomes a monster that eats us up!

In other words, repressive people and overly sexualized people are very destructive, very unhappy unless they are abusing other humans, and utterly unsatiable.

This is why the nobelest of arts and crafts tap into sexual energy but don't allow it to run the show, namely, the more oblique an creator is, the more the results resonate in other, non-sexual ways that open the mind to more than just eat/sex/sleep animal nature.

The Christian religion is amusing to me because they took the much more honest and severe more stone-age Jewish-tribalism and turned it into a rarified mishmash of all the Mediterranean religions plus whatever else it encountered in the forests of barbarian Europe and made it "holy". So the God Zu of ancient Ur in Mesopotamia, who had to be in horse form to have sex with other proto-goddesses, mutated into Zeus and extended the ability to morph into changing into swans and bulls as well as horses, even a shower of golden sperm, this was altered into the non-sexual Jewish Yahweh turning into Zu and using the other aspect of the Flying Horse, namely, the bird, to impregnate a human female.

This bizarre oddity was extended by having the bird not have sex but merging with the human. Except it didn't, it sort of hyper-merged and then flew off. Explaining all this has created many rifts in the early Church which were resolved by brute force, the Emperor decideding in Nicea that there were three entities, they were all the same but different, the Father, the Son and the Holy ~~Zu, the Flying God of Ur~~ Ghost. This troublesome trio still cause theological problems which will, according to the True Believers, will be resolved with the Apocalypse. Whoopee.

Talk about sexual needs out of control! For you see, displacing sex is dangerous because it is closely allied to all those other dark urges in our brains, the urge to kill and eat everything one meets, the desire to stomp around the planet like a T-rex, bellowing and ripping things up, as usual, death/sex/food are the highest and nastiest, the nobelest and most hideous parts of our brains, our psyches, ourselves.

And coping with this will always be difficult. Meanwhile, the real question is, why are people who can't control any of their psychic dark selves running around telling me how to live my own life? Seriously, this is a huge difficulty and annoyance. I have to spend a lot of time dealing with them. And they tick me off for now they want to control my sex life in very intimate ways like taking away my control over my uterus and when I have children.

Zu, where are you? Throw a few thunderbolts. But not at me, thank you.
*************************************************************
Previous Similar Articles
*************************************************************
To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Boston University Professor Claims Jesus Did Pot

2006-01-08T13:51:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Professor Bennett suggests that Jesus used pot. We still don't know how he managed to make fine chablis wine on command, I hope they figure that out. I have a deep water well and it is too cold to grow grapes here.

From the Guardian:

Jesus as almost certainly a cannabis user and an early proponent of the medicinal properties of the drug, according to a study of scriptural texts published this month. The study suggests that Jesus and his disciples used the drug to carry out miraculous healings.

The anointing oil used by Jesus and his disciples contained an ingredient called kaneh-bosem which has since been identified as cannabis extract, according to an article by Chris Bennett in the drugs magazine, High Times, entitled Was Jesus a Stoner? The incense used by Jesus in ceremonies also contained a cannabis extract, suggests Mr Bennett, who quotes scholars to back his claims.

Like, keep on trucking, JC! Dude!

Long hair? Check.

Strange eyes with big, big pupils. Check.

Flowing robes. Check.

Hung out at local bars and saloons with gang members. Check.

Liked wine so much he made it out of water magically. Way to go, check.

Harrassed by da man and executed by fascist pigs. Super check.

Still kept on trucking, will return later after he is done hanging out in Heaven, playing a harp and zoning out. Check.

Yes, this sounds pretty rad. Jesus is definitely a counter-culture, wild eyed hater of the rich, demanding everyone join communes and share with each other, whoo hoo. He sounds awfully familiar, like some of my boyfriends. Of course, he was supposed to not be interested in grrrrlz but then, the gay rights movement came out of the whole hippie-pot scene, didn't it, eh?

WWJD? Roll a joint, man. Take a toke and don't bogart that joint, my friend. Sigh.

Wow. Psychadelic city.
*************************************************************
Previous Similar Articles
*************************************************************
To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Happy Hannuka and Remembering the Quarter Million Dead This Anniversary

2005-12-26T22:45:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

This week, the Hannuka candles are lit in many homes including that of my own family. And this is the anniversary of the Boxing Day Quake. A quarter million people were swept away suddenly. Today, we pray for them and for all those people who have died this year, there are so many, so very many, let us remember them if only for a little bit. The Gates of Death will be all our destination, too, eventually.

From the BBC:

"I think you need to come back," Swedish survivor Pigge Werkelin, who lost his two young sons and his wife in the disaster, told Reuters news agency.

"You need to go to the beach, you have to see children on the beach, you have to see everything... I must do it and then afterward I can put it behind me."

The pain of loss is on many levels. Such as this person, when you lose the one you choose to love, it causes a hole in the heart which remains there no matter how hidden. I know, my grandfather's first love, she died before they could consumate the marriage. He married my grandmother and never talked about the previous love until his last days when Elizabeth was much on his mind. He thought I was her, often times, and talked to me as if nothing had ever happened.

The loss of children is a whole different dimension. There is considerable rage attached to losing one's child. I can only imagine what it feels like, I have children. When my son was born, I nearly died. What did I say to the doctors? "Don't let anything happen to my baby, don't worry about me."

Parents throw themselves into incredible danger to save their children. This fall, when our area was hit by sudden floods, two children were swept away by the raging waters and the stepfather threw himself in to save them and they all drowned.

This is love on a heroic scale. And everyone is a hero, whether we care for a loved elderly person or a child, the patient work or the sudden rush to danger, this need to save the ones we love, nay, the desire to save even total strangers, this is what makes humanity worth loving and is why we must ask all our gods of whoever they think they are, to show us some mercy.

And for us to love the mother of all mothers, the number one in our extended family: Mother Earth. For She is of uttermost importance. If we take care of Her and show Her respect and love, She will try Her best to be gentle with us, in return.
*************************************************************
Previous Similar Articles
Animals Mourn
The Goddess Doesn't Care About Us
Strange Children, Lightning and Death
*************************************************************
To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Apocalyptic Right Wing Nuts Take Over Airforce Academy

2005-12-26T08:08:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

People planning for creating Armaggeddon have built mega-churches all around the Airforce Academy because subverting American youth into cogs in the Apocalypse machinery is how they plan the implimentation of The End of Time. You see, the AF is who controls many of those wonderful nuclear missiles! It is vital that we not let insane religious nuts access to launching nuclear war.

From Online Journal:

Four Air Force officers -- all graduates of the Air Force Academy's class of 2004 -- have recently joined a lawsuit that accuses leaders at the academy of overtly pressuring cadets to undertake evangelical religious instruction. The original lawsuit was filed in October by Mikey Weinstein, a former Air Force officer and graduate of the academy, whose son experienced religious discrimination while attending the school.

A number of news outlets have covered this story but few go as far as this fine article by
Devlin Buckley.

In addition to being headquarters for Air Force Space Command, Northern Command, NORAD, numerous Air Force bases, and the Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs is also home to the nation's largest, most influential and politically active evangelical organizations: James Dobson's Focus on the Family, which is so large that it maintains its own zip code, claims more than 200 million followers worldwide, and is located directly across the highway from the academy.

And more than his organization, every lunatic End of Times organization has parked a van next to the AF academy! Few people connect all the dots, of course, I must be one of the few. One fact one must remember is that on 9/11, Bush threw all the reporters off the plane and secretly, yes, SECRETLY flew to Offutt Airforce Base where I am assuming (correctly) that he talked about the Apocalypse and how they all were going to be in the front rows of it all and how they would all be Jesus' death rays, raining death on one third of humanity, Hallelujia!A professional team providing worldwide reconnaissance, real-time intelligence, command and control, information warfare and combat support to national leadership and warfighting commanders.Here is their mission:

A professional team providing worldwide reconnaissance, real-time intelligence, command and control, information warfare and combat support to national leadership and warfighting commanders.

Note what a superb job they did on 9/11---Not! Over and over one has to ask this very important question: why did all the officers, all of the Airforce officers trained in Colorado, sit on their asses on 9/11? They sat there, slack-jawed as not one but four civilian airliners were hijacked and not one but three reached their targets, one being the Pentagon, and did this over a long time period, leisurely, taking their sweet time, flying way out of the way, flying at subsonic speeds past many of the biggest Airforce bases on the East Coast and note one plane intercepted them, trailed after them, did virtually anything.

It was either the world's biggest case of rank incompetence as has characterized the entire Bush maladministration or it was deliberate and I fall in the "deliberate" camp very strongly at this point. The sad fact is, we can't trust our own Airforce anymore because they no longer exist to protect America, they exist to cause World War Three. The harrassment of Jewish on other religionists at the academy is important because they need 100% co-conspiritors who will trigger the Apocalypse on command. Right now, there are enough non-Apocalypticans in the system to raise the alarm or leak the conspiritor's plans to the public.

Bush is the leader in this conspiracy. Like Hitler before him, his family's good friend, Bush wants to take the entire planet down with him if he is going to go up in flames. This is typical of megamaniacs. Just like a drunken sot, after bankrupting the family, up to his ears in saloon bar tabs and gambling debts, strangles the children in their beds, kills the wife and then goes out and has a shoot-out with the police. Some go further like Jim Jones who famously ordered all his followers to drink purple Kool Aid.

During the late 1970's, Jones had been abusing prescription drugs and appears to have become increasingly paranoid. Rumors of human rights abuses circulated. As in most high-intensity religious groups, there was a considerable flow of people joining and leaving the group.

Bush is showing signs of someone either taking drugs again or drinking heavily again or both. He is certainly paranoid. He talks bizarrely, walks erratically, falls at odd times when there is nothing really tripping him up, careens about crashing into things, his behavior is enough to trigger an impeachment for incapacity to run the nation.

But this won't happen unless Americans wake up in alarm and the problem here is the 33% of America that wants Jesus to rain death from on high, for the heavens to open up and disgorge nuclear missiles on all those blue voting cities. The critical divide here is stark: much of the population centers, all ground zeros for the Apocalypse's nuclear missiles, voted against the born again Christians and their leaders! Listen carefully to the idle chat in the red rural areas. "Maybe we should nuke LA and kill all those kooks!"

As we note here, this crazy 33% has turned Christmas into a nightmare whit their incessant whining about lack of Jesus (he hated hypocrites above all people) and thier boycotts of businesses and strong armed attacks on businesses who tried to appeal to any and all minorities or women's groups. They have supported illegal and unconstitutional actions of their paranoid, insane leader and his gang of co-conspiritors. They reall do believe that Jesus is going to murder masses of humans so they can "inherit the earth" and consume all that lovely oil, toodling around Kansas in their Humvees, laughing diabolically.

In other words, they will become the devils they claim they will defeat.

From the People's Daily:

The cabinet and the Security Council of Japan approved Saturday a budget in fiscal 2006 to proceed with joint development of a next-generation missile interceptor with the United States.

"With the results of Japan-U.S. research so far and given the current international circumstances, it is appropriate to efficiently push forward to joint development in order to secure the capability to deal with the threat of ballistic missiles," Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe said in a statement.

For the joint development of the upgraded version of the Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) with the United States, the cabinet approved Saturday 3 billion yen (about 25.54 million U.S. dollars) as development costs in fiscal 2006 and 700 million yen (about 5. 96 million dollars) for remaining work of joint research.

The move to develop the advanced SM-3 missile interceptor is politically sensitive , considering Japan's pacifist constitution and strict arms exports controls.

Abe stressed that Japan needs to be able to defend itself against ballistic missiles and that arms exports to the United States related to the joint missile defense project are exempt from Japan's weapons export ban, under the condition that they are strictly managed.

Anyone remember World War II? Remember how the Japanese fought to the very last man on each tiny island? How the civilians on Okinawa were ordered to jump to their deaths rather than surrender? How America decided to commit a war crime and nuke, without warning, two civilian populations in Japan in order to scare the Emperor into finally surrendering? And the crazy Emperor who was raised to believe he was a god, finally ran behind the backs of the military men surrounding him and surrendered suddenly when they were preparing to fight literally to the death?

Gads. Let's give that culture a bunch of nuclear missiles!

This is why we should all be alarmed about what is happening to the Airforce Academy. We could end up as Imperial Japan. Already, we are hyper-hostile and vicious. We try to clothe our crimes in Iraq in the garb of freedom and liberty but this is collapsing even as I type, the civil war there is now roiling in ernest and our military leaders are, like in Imperal Japan, lying to us, they claim they are pulling out troops while they aren't because it is deteriorating there fast.

And yet more WWIII news here: From RIAN, Russia:

The launch has been conducted successfully," Sergei Ivanov said in a report to the Russian President. "The separation of all stages, combat and simulation blocks occurred according to pre-set parameters."

It was earlier reported that the missile was launched Wednesday from the submerged Dmitry Donskoy, a Typhoon-class ballistic missile submarine, and successfully hit its dummy target at the Kura test site on the Kamchatka Peninsula.

"What is important is that the submarine was moving [underwater], it was not stationary," the minister said.

Um, the anti-missiles in Japan can't stop this! The waters around Japan are teeming with subs from China, Russia and the USA. Not to mention North Korea. If many if not all of them have nuclear warheads, this is a great place to launch WWIII. Of course, Iran/Iraq will have subs and nukes too, eventually. Thanks to the stupid war we brought to Iraq, Iran will become the world's biggest oil exporter.

From Al Jazeera:

Sheikh Ahmad Fahad Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah, the president of Opec, said at a press conference on Sunday that Russia was the world's second-leading oil exporter behind Saudi Arabia and a critical force in ensuring oil market stability.

OPEC never stabilized prices. But they are a great place for people to make deals of various sorts. The Saudi attempt at curtailing Saddam's power has backfired badly and now they have, on their east and north flanks, angry Shi'ites who have a nasty chip on the shoulder and who openly proclaim the Saudi royals are not taking care of the spiritual side of Mecca and they should run Mecca.

And then there is bin Laden. The man who looks like Jesus. The man who is the mirror image of Jesus and who talks like and acts like Death Ray Jesus, wielder of the Apocalypic Lightning Bolts. The remarkable similarity of him to the born again right wing Republican's idea of what Jesus is all about is amazing. It is exactly as the Bible foretold: the "Christians" would follow the Evil Jesus and worship him.

For these so-called "Christians" are in cahoots with bin Laden. This is why they didn't fight back when he supposedly attacked us on 9/11, this is why all our security forces set up to track terrorists allowed them to openly function before 9/11, this is the only explanation for why, when we supposedly had bin Laden cornered the following December, we suspended fighting and allowed him to "escape". This is why he openly called for Bush to be reinstalled as "President" and why barely a soul working for Bush mentions his name and of course the anthrax killer who is obviously very close to Bush and the born again conspiritors who are planning the Apocalypse....Note how little they talk about HIM and how feeble the hunt for this serial killer goes!

Happy New Year, everyone. Impeach Bush, put them all in jail.

Previous similar articles:
The Crusades
Boeing Ad Is About the Apocalypse
Pat Robertson Throws Lightning Bolts at Dover
****************************************************************
To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Winter Solstice Madness: Bush Fends Off Impeachment Talk While Saddam Imitates Bush's Fake Piety

2005-12-21T07:39:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The illegal and capricious spying on innocent Americans practicing their First Amendment rights is causing Bush endless headaches. His hit squad of right wing TV and print squawkers are busy yelling that this was neccessary to protect America from Vegans and little old Quaker ladies. Meanwhile, Saddam rips a page from the Bush satanic playbook and is pretending to be pious.

From Yahoo:

A noticeably calmer Saddam Hussein sat quietly in his defendant's chair at the resumption of his trial Wednesday, two weeks after he called the court "unjust" and boycotted a session. When the judge refused to let him take a break to pray, the former leader closed his eyes and appeared to pray from his seat.

Saddam is a much better actor than Bush. Bush has a very hard time sitting still in a church or at funerals. I have watched him crane his head as he looks all around, seeking something distracting to focus on, hoping for bananas, I assume. He squinches up his face when pretending to pray. At solemn occassions he smirks inappropriately. The full force of his right wing buddies in the media have to be applied to make him appear pious. These same idiots spend a lot of time attacking real Christians like President Carter. His piety annoyed Americans because it is sincere.

Humans absolutely love fake piety which is why this is the one thing that irritated Jesus the most and why the rich and the pretend pious, especially if they were both, were the ones doomed to hell.

Meanwhile, back at the homefront stormfront, Rumsfeld broke the ironclad Bush rule of never speaking about bin Laden, old family buddy. From Yahoo:

Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden may no longer be able to run the militant network and has not been heard from for nearly a year, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on Wednesday.

Um, the last time old bin spoke was just before the election where he taunted us to reinstall Bush and was looking forward to Bush bungling for four more years. I am assuming he laughed himself to death when we meekly obeyed and reinstalled the world's most inept leader.

Rumsfeld's comments echoed earlier assessments by the U.S. ambassador to Pakistan, Ryan Crocker, but contradicted the assertion of al Qaeda's deputy leader, Ayman al-Zawahri, in a video interview this month that bin Laden's battle against the West was only just beginning.

Since al Qaeda has been a busy little bee for rather a while and seems pretty unstoppable despite every despot in the world focusing on stopping it, I wouldn't be crowing about bin Laden's silence. What does he have to say to anyone? "Bwahahaha"? Seriously. He has achieved a great thing: he is much bigger than he actually is, namely, he is now a symbol of anti-Americanism and that force is flowing stronger and stronger each day.

We should never forget bin Laden's ultimate game stategy: to tangle America up in a thousand small actions in Muslim lands whereby we must kill religious people with impunity and thus, by forcing us to spend an extra $200+ billion a year on security and an extra $200 billion for the Pentagon which, according to his and my calculations, will bankrupt us in about 5 more lousy years, and voila!

No more American empire. Note how swiftly Russia had to shrink when they went bankrupt! They not only lost all their provinces, Russia itself began to shatter! They are still fighting raging civil wars there.

Since both Rumsfeld and Bush seem to be operating as agents of the bin Laden bankruptcy plans aided and abetted by American capitalists and financiers in Asia, one is very puzzled about this "war on terror." Once the villain announces his nefarious plot, isn't one supposed to use that information to avoid falling into said villain's snares? So why are all our leaders falling into bin Laden's obvious trap?

Smells like traitors, doesn't it? Looting the treasury during wartime is, to me, the ultimate treason. Arrest them all. Sigh.

To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Bad Santas in New Zealand--Born Again Santas Attack Walmart

2005-12-18T21:02:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The war over Christmas rages on. It always was thus. Theft and riots, paganism vs puritanical aesthetes. This war is particularily pathetic since all one has to do is imitate Jesus if one wants to have that. Of course, this means acting like the original St. Nicholas which is boring since all he did was go to prison, starve himself and give away everything he owned. Sort of like a guy named "Jesus."

From Yahoo:

A group of religious protesters demonstrated outside a Wal-Mart superstore Saturday, hoping to turn away customers by calling attention to the retailer's decision to use "happy holidays" rather than "merry Christmas" in its seasonal advertising.

But even shoppers who agreed with the protesters weren't willing to interrupt their quest for holiday deals.

"I believe in Christ, and I don't like the use of 'xmas' or the use of 'happy holidays,'" said Steven Van Noy, 39, as he left the store loaded down with packages. "The bottom line is that they had what I needed at Wal-Mart, so I went to Wal-Mart to buy it."

The picuture here has to be seen to be believed:

Why is this man wearing a Santa suit and waving the "War on Christmas" book doing this? The red coated, fat, furry Santa has absolutely zero to do with the pro-Christian mythologically inspired but rather real person, St. Nicholas who gave away money to save people such as giving a father money so he wouldn't put his daughters in a whore house, for example. Unlike the present crop of Christians who seem to think Christmas is all about saying "Merry Christmas" while dropping bombs on Muslims! And shopping for one's own self and family.

According to the Catholic EnyclopediaSt. Nicholas was a thin aesthete who died in early December in the mid 350s and he lived in Lycia, Asia Minor, not the north pole. He was a thin, intense bishop, not a fat, jolly man hanging around elves churning out toys, indeed, he probably didn't approve of toys at all in any way, shape or form, much less eating candy canes and sugar plums. Indeed, the early Church was big on denial of comforts and fasting!

But in 1087, some wily Italian merchants stole his body (they took whatever wasn't nailed to the floor just like Norse traders who found it more lurcative to loot, too) and transplanted it into Italy where the much nicer incarnations of old Kris Kringle was created. The insane man demonstrating against Walmart should be screaming at the shoppers to not buy any presents but to give to the poor only that is who shops there, for the most part. Actually, he should be in front of the higher end stores doing that but he isn't and he won't and you can bet, he will be arrested and beaten into the ground if he did dare do that.

It is all fake. Now for the other half of the Santa yin/yang yazoo:

From Australia:

A group of 40 drunken people dressed in Santa Claus outfits went on a rampage through New Zealand's largest city, Auckland, robbing stores, assaulting security guards and urinating from highway overpasses.

The rampage, dubbed "Santarchy" by newspapers, began early yesterday afternoon when the men, wearing ill-fitting Santa costumes, threw beer bottles and urinated on cars from an overpass, said Auckland Central Police's Noreen Hegarty.

She said the men then rushed through a central city park, overturning garbage bins, throwing bottles at passing cars and spraying graffiti on office buildings.

These men are another manifestation of A Clockwork Orange ethos. Namely, disturbed, alienated, drunken louts roaming about in gangs, looking to mock the bourgoise pretentions of stuffy normality. This insane sort of behavior is rather amusing only if you are watching from afar, it is no fun to be the victim of such creepy men.

A number of countries that were part of the dead British Empire have problems with detached males running amok. In England itself, they plague football games and run around in public, harrassing and intimidating other residents. They hate foreigners yet haven't the faintest idea about how they were the foreigners who took over a number of countries to run them as they pleased. So, like all dying imperil powers, the populace becomes brutal and angry and takes things out on helpless victims rather than pull up and do something useful.

They won't be sent into imperial battles to kill off or tame the excess male population so the problem grows worse each generation.

In America, we are following the same path which is why we recruit more and more overseas, handing over our miltary to mercenaries just like England did in its final years. We fret about our comforts even as we show irritability about the whole thing and go more and more into thrill seeking that is aimless and painful. The riots wracking Australia this winter are due to the same sort of thing: the populations of previous imperial population flows clashing over receeding resources. Like in America, the social safety net is being withdrawn and instead of understanding why this is happening, the population joins the leaders on imperialist adventures they can't afford in places like Iraq and then recoil when the side effects of this cause malfunctions at home.

Both England and Australia couldn't wait to join in the imperial looting expedition in Iraq that has turned into a hyper expensive rout. They aren't paying even 1% of the burden of this mess in troop losses or money but they are shrunken artifacts and can't even sustain this miserable bit of imperial misadventuring without losing a lot at home.

If England and Australia chase out all immigrants, they won't be stronger, they will be weaker since the weakness is internal, the arrogance of imperialism has cause terminal mental rot as the populace is unable to understand, they no longer lead the world and can make the world work for them. Note how busy the Asians are in reorganizing themselves and taking over business and diplomatic affairs! Our adventures have turned us into beggars at Asia's gates.

To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Strange Children, Lightning, Death and Art and Christmas

2005-12-15T21:19:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

This week, the New Yorker magazine has an article about the author who wrote "Mary Poppins." I was never a fan of the books but it is very similar to other such books that are very much in favor these days such as the Harry Potter books. I know the author of Harry Potter is a "magician" but it startled me to read about the spirit world of Helen Goff who changed her name to Travers when she grew up and wrote "Mary Poppins."

From the New Yorker:

One night in the middle of a thunderstorm, Margaret (the writer's mother) left Helen (10 years old!) in charge of the two younger children, telling her that she was going to drown herself in a creek. As an old woman, Travers wrote about the terrifying experience: "Large-eyed, the little ones looked at me--she and I called them the little ones, both of us aware that an eldest child, no matter how young, can never experience the heart's ease that little ones enjoy." Helen stirred the fire and then they all lay down (after mother left in despair) on the hearth rug and she told them a story about a magical flying horse, with the small ones asking excited questions ("Could he carry us to the shiny land, all three, on his back?"). As she tried to distract them, she worried about the future....

Her mother came back that night, unsuccessful in her suicide attempt...

One can google "Pegasus/lightning/death" and see these elements are united within and around this ancient divinity. The first records of Him are in the city of Ur. The Great Square is where He comes from, so to speak. It rises in the East in springtime this last 4000 years and this is when the thunderstorms start.

It is interesting to me that Helen (my name is the English form of Helen), when forced to face the Doors of Death, latched onto Pegasus in a thunderstorm and He came. Since His greatest gift is the ability to create art, one is gifted if one sees Him. But the price extracted is severe. Most people only see Pegasus. To grab hold of His shimmering, flaming mane, to grasp the beating wings, this is pure pain.

P.L. Travers ended up leaving her birthplace in Australia and moved to Dublin where she joined up with the stellar circle of artists such as the famous poet, Yeats, who lived next door to her and who drew her into the Theosphical Society.

I have known members of that society. Very old women and men. They don't like me much for I always end up telling them, "Magic always backfires no matter what." The condundrum of trying to manipulate fate and time and the cosmos is to me, self obvious. What is created never is what one desires. For obvious reasons (it is too complicated).

Travers, like many before her and many after, thought she could sell herself and get rich and pay no price, spiritually. So, at the urging of her friends after she couldn't make money as a poet, she wrote "Mary Poppins." She made a lot of money on that subject and then decided to make more and like Winnie the Pooh's creator (who she also knew), she sold it to Disney.

Thus the famous movie which she hated since it had virtually nothing to do with her original book and was twisted into a totally different moral tale. What was worse was, as per usual with Disney, the magical parts were turned into vapid, mundane plodding stuff which seems to please multitudes for some reason.

But again, it is like all magical things: the minute you put a money value on it, it dies.

The Witch, the Lion and the Wardrobe is another interesting similar story. Lewis is dead so he has no say. The movie tries to reproduce the book which was scattered with vapidity in the first place since Lewis couldn't dare explore the true meaning of the Outer Darkness. So he made it cute just like Travers.

The idea is, children aren't supposed to know about death.

Lewis, like Travers, lost parents and had to cope with the darkness in the heart at a young age. And if both writers had approached the terror of that directly, I suspect they would have lost their iron control over the feelings. I know how this works for the hardest thing for me to do is confront my early childhood. The picture above tore me up as I drew it. My heart was racing and my hands kept shaking and I had to make corrections.

Drawing Pegasus' eyes was particularily difficult and easy at the same time. I basically let the pen do what it wanted, I wondered how the eyes would look. They look right.

This is what children see when they see It Happening. At least, this is what I saw and what Helen Travers visualized. When Pegasus darted past me as I was dying when I was hit by lightning, I took hold and was carried back into the land of the living. My parents, being religious, could not accept this gift I was given and so it was a terrible gift, opening a big rift between us which grows over the years until it is now a yawning chasm. Religions should bring people together but they really don't. They channel the despair. I look back through the tunnel of time and can't understand why my own parents couldn't accept what had happened to me. I didn't ask for it.

This force which visited myself is the wellspring of children's literature. All fairy tales well up from this same source, stamped into the stone by Pegasus' iron hooves. Beatrix Potter rode this horse and when dismounted, could only talk about it via cuddly, small animals but the shadows of death stretch across her small stories. Winnie the Pooh destroyed Christopher Robin. The boy that animated and loved the bear was tortured over this all his childhood by mocking children who couldn't resist tormenting him until he broke with his father and cursed the bear and the fantasy.

He sold it to Disney, too, who erased the shadow of death and destruction and made it all cute. This week, Disney just killed Christopher Robin off and replaced him with a girl figure because she would be more "marketable" to young girls, little boys being certainly no target for toy sales and making money on the fantasies that broil out of the Outer Darkness is what Disney is all about.

In my case, when I saw "Fantasia," I instantly clutched my chair arms and said, "That is Him!" but then two seconds later, the "cute" baby horses appeared and the whole splendid thing along with the tortured genius, Beethoven's great music, crashed to the ground. Disney even had Pegasus flying in a really dumb thunderstorm, a moment of beauty in a mishmash mess. This only made me feel worse. But then, we have to look at how the Born Again Christians have destroyed the Bible! Truly, a book about magic, dark things and death, a plunge into the darker vortex of the Outer Darkness! And they have Disneyfied it to wretched nothingness.

This is why they are hysterical about Christmas while unable to understand how the sun, the stars and the Gods intersect when the night is the longest and the dark the deepest. To light a small fire in defiance of all that is what it is all about. And they can't see that.

They want candy and toys and Santa Claus who doesn't care how naughty and mean you are, just give it to them, now.

To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Mega Churches Close Christmas Sunday To Stay Home for Pagan Parties

2005-12-08T14:26:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Christmas had zero to do with giving yourself and your immediate family presents unless one is an unreformed pagan celebrating Saturnalia. Even they didn't do it this way, the slaves were allowed to pretend to be masters on Saturnalia, for example, and Christians used this time to hand out alms to the poor. Today, we learn that a number of Mega Churches aren't even going to open on Sunday so they can stay home and perform various neo-paganistic rites of gluttony and self indulgence. This is how they are fighting Jesus!

From Yahoo:

This Christmas, no prayers will be said in several megachurches around the country. Even though the holiday falls this year on a Sunday, when churches normally host thousands for worship, pastors are canceling services, anticipating low attendance on what they call a family day.

Critics within the evangelical community, more accustomed to doing battle with department stores and public schools over keeping religion in Christmas, are stunned by the shutdown.

It is almost unheard of for a Christian church to cancel services on a Sunday, and opponents of the closures are accusing these congregations of bowing to secular culture.

"This is a consumer mentality at work: `Let's not impose the church on people. Let's not make church in any way inconvenient,'" said David Wells, professor of history and systematic theology at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, a leading evangelical school in Hamilton, Mass. "I think what this does is feed into the individualism that is found throughout American culture, where everyone does their own thing."

It is much worse. It is exactly what the entire Jesus business isn't about: self indulgence. The same howlers who attend these heretical houses of worship are the same people leaning on us to harrass and discriminate against gays, hate Muslims and despise all other religions, they are working day and night to make us uncomfortable and unhappy because we won't worship the bizarre antichrist they all kneel in front of every week except Christmas Sunday.

It is telling that the hordes of fake Christians boycott their own churches on the High Holy Days. I remember how we did it in the Luthern Church: nighttime services on Christmas Eve, our parents sternly telling us there is no Santa Claus, then Christmas morning, well, Lutherns didn't do the gift opening that morning. You EXCHANGED gifts the night before, long before that old pagan, Santa Claus, supposedly magically appeared. And when exchanging, you give thanks, more, you must give at least as much to the poor, and believe me, we did that in spades.

"Jesus and his mother and father were homeless," my mother would say before sweeping out of the house with baskets of food and clothing and toys for poor children. In my mind to this day, she is the true Santa Claus!

The entire Christian religion is going through one of its usual antichristian moments. Always, when claiming to be moved by Jesus, this coincides with murderous rampages like the Crusades or the Reformation/Inquisition mess that killed nearly a third of the people in Central Europe, or the spreading of Christianity in the New World which ended up killing 90% of the natives on way or another! A bloody mess.

Very unchristian. So just remember: they are all fakers. They really hate Jesus as much as they hate any liberals who talk about feeding the poor, healing the sick or helping the lame. These people are the first to work Tiny Tim's dad in China to death just so they can buy cheap toys for their own children.

Bah, humbug. Pass the Wasshail and drink hearty!

To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

Thugs Attack Kansas Professor--They Believe They Can't Evolve

2005-12-08T09:22:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

A professor at the University of Kansas was attacked on a back road by thugs outraged at him talking about "Christians", mocking them for their childish belief in a fantasy world where gods create things out of thin air and then kill everything out of spite. They don't want anyone to mock them while they ran around acting like bezerk lunatics. Christian thugs have been ruining our holidays, ruining schools, ruining everything they latch onto, especially poor Jesus.

From Yahoo:

A college professor whose planned course on creationism and intelligent design was canceled after he derided Christian conservatives said he was beaten by two men along a rural road early Monday.

University of Kansas religious studies professor Paul Mirecki said the men referred to the class when they beat him on the head, shoulders and back with their fists, and possibly a metal object, the Lawrence Journal-World reported.

"I didn't know them," Mirecki said of his assailants, "but I'm sure they knew me."

Ah, Kansas! KU is where I went to college for one summer. It was exciting, filled to the brim with tornadoes, lightning strikes, the death (dark doings) of a student in the auditorium which eventually was burned down by lightning strikes (grrrr). What a place! It pretty much changed my life! To me, Kansas is like some sort of churning darkness of the soul, something in that sunny place runs like an icy breath, I think there is a great number of things wrong, spiritually, with Kansas. I saw it face to face, during a violent thunderstorm.

Maybe it is because it is not only the center of the USA, it is held up by cynical manipulators as "real America." I remember Bob the Lobbyist Dole ranting about how great Kansas was and how he just couldn't wait to return to that place. He told the people there, they were superior, spiritually, to those evil doers in New York or California. He made it sound like he and all his fellow worshippers of money and power just couldn't wait to run home to dear old Kansas, the state he supposedly loved and represented.

Well, he turned tail and ran like hell. To demonic DC. He can't stand Kansas for even five minutes. They all hate Kansas. This is why the place struggles to keep its young. They leave as soon as humanly possible. And the people making life unbearable in Kansas don't understand, few people want to live around them, they make life really miserable.

Lawrence is a lovely burg. I loved a number of things there. It is an island of liberality in a sea of reactionaries. Watching the right wing lunatics destroy KU is annoying but not surprizing. Since they prize stupidity, it is obvious, one has to intimidate anyone who challenges stupidity. We all see this with Bush and his lunatics. They scream at us, threaten us, attack everyone, they murderously kill thousands of people and torture many people just to get us to go along with their insane, destructive, idiotic world views! The river of blood doesn't bother them, us talking back drives them nuts!

Imagine if gangs of lefties roamed about America, beating up and torturing conservatives. Calling for the headquarters of the Hudson Institute to be blown up or blowing up mega churches! Just setting fire to some Humvees sends the right wing nuts in the FBI over the wall! The US Attorney General singling out some minor eco groups as top terrorists!

Since nearly the entire state apparatus is behind the right wing they feel emboldened to not only talk trash and threats, they carry them out with impunity.

Mirecki had referred to religious conservatives as "fundies," and said a course describing intelligent design as mythology would be a "nice slap in their big fat face." He has apologized for those comments.

Right wing fundies like the odious O'Reilly can call for the destruction of San Francisco or whip up fenzies of hate towards civilized citizens who want to have a happy holiday, Ann Coulter can suggest the NYT building in Manhattan be blown up and this is a-OK but if anyone calls fundies "fundies", they must apologize.

Our Vice President can call war heroes traitors and we are supposed to clap. If anyone says he angled for one deferment after another which caused America to lose the Vietnam war, he blows up. How dare anyone talk about his chicken-shit past!

And this is how the right wing operates: a double standard. Someone states the obvious and they get their classes cancelled, they are beaten up by unevolved thugs and are forced to apologize while violent reactionaries can spout whatever violent claptrap they want and get pay raises and praise! Look at Ann Coulter! She is lionized by Newsweek after making terrorist threats!

You won't see this poor professor lionized. Mauled by lions in the arena, yes.

To return to homepage click here
To read more financial news click here
Washington Pest

O Tannenbaum--Religious Right Steals Woden's Sacred Tree!

2005-12-01T18:14:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Once again, the crazy religious right gets the GOP leadership all shook up over very insane things, this month is time to attack the use of the word "holiday". Well, they do want to work us all to death so no vacations for us! Besides, the things the Christian right wants to appropriate for Christ happen to belong to quite a few pagan religions.

From Yahoo:

If it's a spruce tree adorned with 10,000 lights and 5,000 ornaments displayed on the Capitol grounds in December, it's a Christmas tree and that's what it should be called, says House Speaker Dennis Hastert.

Hastert, R-Ill., in a letter to the Architect of the Capitol, recommended that the annual Capitol Holiday Tree, as it has been called the past several years, be renamed the Capitol Christmas Tree.

"I strongly urge that we return to this tradition and join the White House, countless other public institutions and millions of American families in celebrating the holiday season with a Christmas tree," Hastert wrote to Architect Alan Hantman.

His office said the tree began to be referred to as the Holiday Tree in the 1990s. Spokesman Ron Bonjean said the reasons were unclear.

On Dec. 8 Hastert will flip the switch to light the tree, a 65-foot Engelmann Spruce from the Santa Fe National Forest in New Mexico. On Tuesday workmen were erecting the tree on the West Front of the Capitol.

Well, not everyone is a Christian and besides, the trees have zero to do with Christianity. It is useful to refer to the Winter Solstice season as a "holiday." For that is what all this is!

There is zero information connecting Jesus with anything surrounding the Saturnalia of winter. Nearly everything we stuck onto this holiday is 100% pagan. Santa Claus is just an incarnation of Woden riding the night storms, you have to put food in a tannenbaum tree to keep him from doing something nasty like hitting you with lightningbolts! It didn't work for me, of course. I gave up. Woden wants to belt me occassionally, leaving pretzels and apples for him in a tree is pretty useless.

Santa and his Valkerie elves wasn't a nice man who wanted to give us goodies. Just allowing us to live was sufficient. One certainly had to guard his passage through the wind auge or the smoke hole. Usually, when Vikings visit, they burn down the house and steal everything so I suppose that is sort of Christmasy for them!

The drinking of Wassail is very pagan. Lighting up stuff especially bonfires to bring back the sun, very pagan.

Christmas trees were introduced in the Hudson valley in the 1840s by a German tutor who was a romatic and loved pagan stuff from the past. This was a big movement in Germany at that time culminating in the famous Richard Wagner Ring Cycle.

Then there is the whole mistletoe stuff. Shades of Merlin! C.S. Lewis was a very pagan man who sugarcoated his paganism with a feeble sort of Christianity which simply ignored all the Jewish/Bible stuff and concentrated on the more pagan rip-offs. For the rulers, when they embraced the Piscean Jesus and spread his fish business into their realms, they simply appropriated any and everything connected with the pre-existing gods and goddesses.

The American right wing hates science and hates history. A young man who explained to a customer at Walmart the simple history of the pagan values of Christmas and why "Happy Holiday" was quite appropriate since we have Hannuka and other celebrations at this time, the Christian right went bezerk and strongarmed Walmart into firing the lad.

The bloviators on TV are once again at it. O'Reilley raged about this on TV but posters on the net discovered he is bullshitting us all yet again. From the Fox TV company store:

The O'Reilly Factor Christmas Ornament - Product #:FOX21001200
Put your holiday tree in "The No Spin Zone" with this silver glass "O'Reilly Factor" ornament.
More...

The First Lady wishes everyone "Happy Holidays" each year and not one born again bozo collapses with a heartattack. So what gives?

After trying in vain to kick the Katrina victims to the curb, these clowns go back to making certain we can't wassail our way around the community singing about TANNENBAUMS which have no "Christmas" anywhere appended to them, they are just trees, and kissing under Druidic misteltoes and in general, giving a partridge in a pear tree to each other, gads.

Eat, drink and be merry, everyone!

Happy Holidays.

To return to homepage click here
To read more religious news click here
Washington Pest

GOP Is Terrified Anti Abortion Laws Will Make Us Abort the GOP

2005-11-18T14:54:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The cat is out of the bag: the GOP is openly fretting about outlawing abortions because they know this is political suicide. They want to fool the religious right to vote for them even though it is all about getting money for rich people, not Jesus loves you stuff.

From the Washington Post:

Reversal of the landmark Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion nationwide could produce an upheaval in U.S. politics and would put candidates who oppose abortion rights at risk of defeat in many parts of the country, a leading House Republican said yesterday.

Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.), chairman of the Government Reform Committee, said the desire of GOP conservatives to see a newly constituted Supreme Court eventually overturn Roe v. Wade could produce a political backlash, particularly in the suburbs. "It would be a sea change in suburban voting patterns," Davis said at a breakfast hosted by the Christian Science Monitor.

All those people wanting tax breaks while loading up debt for the future, crippling our country, will turn in a trice on the GOP if they outlaw drinking, gambling and sex. Period. The party, as is constituted, is to have pretend morals while spreading filth everywhere. The Abramoff scandal reveals just how cynical the GOP is about the business of being holier than thou.

The only thing the right wing Christians got was the Apocalypse. Isn't that sweet? They voted for and adored the guy who worships the Devil that is Death, the Executioner of Texas, the man who spits in the eye of the Nuremburg trials and Geneva Conventions, the man who takes from the poor and gives to the rich!

But they were told he would protect fetuses so they delusionally followed this anti-matter-anti-christ.

Davis's warnings on abortion grow out of the experience of Virginia Republicans in 1989, when the high court ruled that states could begin to restrict access to abortions. That fall, Democrat L. Douglas Wilder won the governor's race, with strong support in Northern Virginia.

"If Roe v. Wade is overturned," Davis said, "you're going to have a lot of very nervous suburban candidates out there. . . . It's easy to say you're for a culture of life, but the answer is what do you do about it at that point."

Let me clue these guys into something: forcing girls to die in back alley abortions isn't "culture of life". Forcing women to have babies against their will isn't wonderful. It is a disaster.

And does planet earth need to have the population shoot up every year? What is this, the Infinite Planet Earth?

Of course not. Like the Hubbert Oil Peak, there is an ecological level where the earth begins to die is ANY organism overmultiplies. Doesn't matter what it is.

And why are the clowns running the GOP playing Taliban politics, anyway? Talk about uncivilized. Here is one of our top owners/allies: Saudi Arabia. From SF Gate:

A Saudi high-school chemistry teacher accused of discussing religion with his students has been sentenced to 750 lashes and 40 months in prison for blasphemy, officials said Thursday.

The court ruling was condemned by human rights activists, who said Mohammed Salamah al-Harbi was being imprisoned for having an "open discussion" with students.

Al-Harbi was convicted of questioning and ridiculing Islam, discussing the Bible and defending Jews, judicial officials said Thursday on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

Prosecutors acted after a complaint by students and al-Harbi's fellow teachers, officials said. The court in the northern province of al-Qassim heard the case Saturday in a six-hour trial.

Al-Harbi was in prison Thursday, but the Saudi newspaper Al-Madinah reported him as saying he would appeal the verdict.

His chances of surviving 750 lashes is around 0. This is what right wing Vatican/Born Again Protestant/Zionist/Jihadist beliefs end up as: vicious persecution of anyone who dares to talk about religion in a sane way.

Just last week, Walmart fired a young man because he explained the need to say, "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas" because so many other religions have holidays at that same time frame including pagans! So the Catholic League demanded this young man's head and Walmart threw him out! And the Catholics were very proud of this ugly deed! At least they couldn't lash the poor kid 750 times but that is where all this will end up!

Religion seeking power over nonbelievers are sick, evil, hideous, destructive and just plain works of devils, not gods.

I don't impose my religion on anyone (want to be hit by lightning! Join me!) so why all these bozos need to do this baffles me. After all, I bet none of these gods can stand any of them. Party poopers and hypocrites, nearly all.

To return to homepage click here
To read more religious news click here

Pat Robertson Throws Lightning Bolts at Dover

2005-11-12T12:29:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

If any of us were to talk like Roberston, we would either be put in an asylum or jail. Evidently, it is OK for him to threaten us all with death, destruction or assassination. Besides, he claims he sent a hurricane to my community twenty years ago and it knocked down my willow tree. I should be able to sue that bastard.

From MSNBC:

“I’d like to say to the good citizens of Dover: if there is a disaster in your area, don’t turn to God, you just rejected him from your city,” Robertson said on his daily television show broadcast from Virginia, “The 700 Club.”

“And don’t wonder why he hasn’t helped you when problems begin, if they begin. I’m not saying they will, but if they do, just remember, you just voted God out of your city. And if that’s the case, don’t ask for his help because he might not be there,” he said.

The 700 Club claims a daily audience of around 1 million. It is also broadcast around the world, translated into more than 70 languages. (People for the American Way provided a video file of the 700 Club statement.)

Yay for the People for the American Way! They have been tagging old Pat for quite a while.

While drawing his face, I noticed this screamer has not one wrinkle on his forehead. He is much older than me and his neck looks like an old turkey gobbler. No wonder his beady eyes are popping out, eh? Heh. Schwarzenegger's face looks like he had so many boxtox shots, it is near death. His unchanging expression is worse than when he was young and expressionless. It is now plastic immobility.

All these clowns seem addicted to preening themselves as if they are Michael Jackson.

To return to homepage click here
To read more religious news click here

Vatican Beatifies Fascist Woman Who Had Frequent Sex

2005-11-07T08:22:00.000-05:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Today, Ratzi the Nazi had one of his Opus Dei bishops beatify a fascist woman who had frequent sex at the behest of Moussolini. Actually, she was a farm woman who copulated like all the animals around her, producing children for imperialist wars. Kinder, Kuchen, Kirche indeed. Why don't those men in the Vatican make babies if it is this important, eh?
From Yahoo:

An Italian mother who raised 11 children moved ahead on the road to possible sainthood Sunday amid a Vatican campaign in favor of large families.

Eurosia Fabris, known as "Mamma Rosa," raised two children whose mother died while they were little, then married their father and had nine children with him.

The virtues of Fabris, who died in 1932, were honored Sunday in a beatification ceremony in Vicenza, near her native farming village in northern Italy. Beatification is the last formal step before possible sainthood.

On Wednesday, Pope Benedict XVI praised large families and called for countries to approve legislation and other incentives to help them. The pontiff has said there is no future without children.

Presiding over the ceremony in Vicenza's cathedral was Cardinal Jose Maria Saraiva Martins, who heads the Vatican office overseeing the process for sainthood.

Up until the fascist take over of the Vatican, women who had lots of sex were evil. Yes, evil. The sex was accepted as inevitable in the case of weaker wills but the ideal was to be "pure" and to give oneself only to Jesus and so on. But when the fascistii took over Italy and then Germany, the satanic ritualists running those countries told the Catholic Church they would enforce birth control bans very rigorously. They needed many babies to recolonize the rest of the planet so they could scream "Lebensraum" as an excuse to exterminate "lesser" peoples especially Jews and the good fascist woman would then mass produce babies to fill in the chasm created by the extermination of the unwanted people.

Fabris, who was born in 1866, was described as being deeply religious from her childhood. Besides the 11 children she raised, Fabris welcomed other children in need into her home. Three of her children became priests and another child became a nun.

So, her kids became part of the Church...Why doesn't the Pope and his band of sexless old men just make all their moms saints? Hell, my mother had seven children and one became a minister, she certainly wanted to be loved a lot. This is how I was popped into the world. She had sex. A lot. Frequently, in fact.

I had kids too. It was hard work which is why it is called "labor". Many European women in the 1800s produced many babies which is why so many Italians are in America today---they couldn't get work in Italy so they had to flee! The capitalists in America wanted workers cheap so they allowed this flood of baby-popping European peasants into America to drive down wages and do dangerous industrial and farm work and die young, to be replaced with more children from those busy peasant women in Europe, having frequent unprotected sex.

The fascist pope wants more babies. The earth is way overpopulated so of course, he wants Catholics to reproduce like rabbits so they can do the "lebensraum" stuff again, killing noncatholics so they can take over more planetary resources. Sieg Heil, Ratzi!

Meanwhile, Bush is trying to stuff the Supreme Court with Opus Dei clones who will force us to have babies so we will have to ship them all over the planet, killing people for lebensraum and world resources. On top of this, Bush and his religious bigot buddies are cutting the social safety net to shreds and standing around, watching passively as thousands of Americans die in storms and plagues and terrorist attacks. Isn't that a nice? Well, welcome to Sieg Heilland. Gott mit uns.

To return to homepage click here

To read more religious news click here

THE TAILS OF NARNIA

2005-10-12T19:47:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Disney made a CS Lewis Narnia movie. It is, as all movies today, artfully done with lots of special effects. It is part of this cultural machine that runs roughshod over ancient mythology and real magic. From the NYT:

With two months to go before the release of its big-budget film "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe," the Walt Disney company wants very much to whet audience appetites by placing music from the soundtrack on radio and music-video channels.

But Disney's tricky marketing strategy for "Narnia" - which includes aggressively courting Christian fans who can relate to the story's biblical allegory while trying not to disaffect secular fans - is particularly tricky when it comes to music.

The NYT itself declared a few months ago that due to the "election" results, they decided to dumb down the paper and make it into a hicksville rag so it would appeal to "Christians". Well, they toned down the NY Angst machine and now publish treacley articles worthy of the Dormouse on a tea binge.

For some bizarre reason, the religious right has latched onto the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and made it into a hyper religious machine to love more than the Bible. This sort of blasphemy has definite connections with the root problems afflicting American religious rightwingers. It is connected with what is the matter with Kansas.

The Narnia books were written as the British Empire was collapsing. The elaborate structure of the White Man's Burden was going up in flames across the entire planet. The sun was setting in blood red skies as even at the heart of the empire, bombs were exploding.

The lust for cosmic/physical powers was very strong and the desire for British White Children to not only "save" another world but to be blessed by the magical creatures and even more, set over them as rulers! OUCH. With a magical lion, a very nasty species, one that happily eats humans as well as any other animals larger than a bread box, with this ueber sized monster working for the human English Christians, it would help them rule the Magic Realm and all the creatures there.

Gads.

The lion and his colonial masters fight Nature in order to change the Order of Things to suit them, for the Lion and the Humans are... savannah plains animals! Both, notorious killers of animals large and small! Why would beavers help either? This is of course, put in to show how the peasants of distant lands wish for the rule of the Great Predators. For they would "save" the hard working beavers from...winter. Which, by the way, beavers deal with just fine, thank you. This is why they work hard to build lodges and stock their ponds with trees as food in winter. Snug, they love winter.

Lions hate winter, and humans can only endure it if they strip animals of their flesh and wear it, not to mention, eating them, too.

Anyway, this ridiculous hodge-podge of myth and fantasy includes star creatures of old, pre Christian mythology, working to be dominated by humans? Unicorns bereft of their sexual powers??? Eh? Not to mention wild, hard to tame, lightning laced Pegasus? And the others, well, since when do sylvian goddesses and sexually wild satyrs want to help British Children?

Geeze, I would laugh if we suggest turning school children over to satyrs! Heh. Well. Maybe good, homeschooled Christian kids from Kansas.

And that lion! Ripped right out of the Wizard of Oz without the careful change of making the lion a coward, thus explaining why Dorothy and her little dog weren't dinner, the Lewis lion is supposed to be noble and a killer for he arranges to kill his opponents so Santa Claus and the tooth fairy and Easter Bunny can show up?

What the fuck?

At this point, one has to scream. Fat old Santa is perfect lion meat. A lion would summon him for dinner, yes. No chat. But of course, the English children expect free presents and everyone bowing to them and then to go off hunting for the White Stag so they could kill it, too.

Great. I vote for the Snow Queen who happens to be a rip off of Hans Christian Anderson who didn't mix up his story metaphors nearly so crazily as CS Lewis did.

In sum, if there is any "Christianity" in "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe," I'm a monkey's aunt.

To return to homepage click here

THE GODDESS DOESN'T CARE ABOUT US

2005-10-08T07:26:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

We are launching religious wars across the planet. These wars are killing many people. But the real war is the one humans are waging against Mother Nature. This literal battle to the death is of course, the stupidest war of all. After all, She is death! And life. Yammering at Her makes no difference. She can take whole mountains and drop them on our heads. She has done this, too, more than once. Her army has many weapons, the single celled contingents being by far one of the most deadly and very hard to stop.

So today's news is, America sucks its thumb as next door neighbor, Mexico, and the Central American states lose many citizens to hurricane Stan which gets nearly no mention in America. From Associated Press:

With food and water running out, governments in Central America and Mexico scrambled Friday to reach isolated areas devastated by a week of intense rain, with residents saying panic was starting to grow among survivors.

Mudslides and flooding exacerbated by Hurricane Stan killed 258 people across the region, with Guatemala bearing the brunt of the damage and deaths.

Increasing fears Friday was a strong earthquake that shuddered through both Guatemala and El Salvador. The quake caused a rain-damaged highway bridge to collapse in Guatemala and also sent thousands of frightened Salvadoran residents into the streets.

And this week, a volcano suddenly belched and a whole bunch of people had to flee burning homes and some died. In New Orleans, most of the bodies of the dead remain unnamed and unclaimed. This startling fact doesn't disturb the sleep of many who hope Mother Nature's work of bringing in the sheaves will be kept at bay by our huge bubble we have painstakingly constructed around us using fossil fuels.

Which is why dear Old Mom is making hay of us.

When the whole world sent us aid after Hurricane Katrina, our press and our religious leaders and Bush all pretended this was due to love and not a slap in the face. Mexico sent aid! There are many many Mexicans in America so it was a friendly gesture in a way but it isn't being returned much, is it? And so we spiral downwards. Europe sent us fuel not because they love us but to prevent world oil prices from spiralling out of control. They are now ticked off that Americans continue to gas guzzle.

&spades From the BBC:

Pakistan says more than 1,000 people may have died in a powerful quake that also hit north India and Afghanistan.
The quake in Kashmir had a magnitude of at least 7.6. The epicentre was 80km (50 miles) north-east of Islamabad.

Pakistan's interior ministry said several villages had been wiped out. A total of 172 are so far confirmed dead in Indian-administered Kashmir.

Rescuers are trying to reach dozens of residents feared trapped in a building collapse in Islamabad.

This earthquake is at one of the hotter political hot spots. It killed people in several countries. These countries are mostly poor.

The American puppet dictator wanted to pretend he and his rule were going to protect Pakistanis. Yet this happened. The collapse of that huge apartment complex...One that killed absolutely everyone inside, it pancaked nearly as badly as the WTC...Has no survivors. The picture's caption in the BBC tells us people are searching for survivors but the actual picture shows a crowd of people standing inert, staring about in disbelief, on top of the flat building.

I check out the IRIS sesmic monitor every time I log on. The fifth of October, the planet fell nearly silent. This was not a good sign, as I keep saying, it is ringing like a bell and that just meant it was preparing for a big blow out yet again. Scientists have decided that Great Quakes travel in clusters, twenty years can go by with nearly nothing and then there is a huge quake and a cascade of slightly smaller ones happen in response.

The Boxing Day quake was a super-great one not just due to magnitude but length and breadth. It was truly a startling earthquake and one that is causing problems every day. In unison with this lates quake, it shook hard yet again. Now Australia will resolutely shove northwards again as Antarctica sheds weight at an increasingly fast rate, we have no idea how much she is shedding under her white cloak. I would suggest it is rather a lot.

Which takes us back to global warming, the rising oceans and our precious bubble.

I would say that all modern religions, the "estatic" ones based on glorification of prophets, they are facing a real test now. Their minions believe that killing the adherents to various rivals is the key to winning this war. But it is a delusion. The American Christians are particularily pathetic in this regard.

From SF Gate:

The White House is denying President Bush ever told top Palestinian officials that God had told him to invade Afghanistan and Iraq and to work for the establishment of a Palestinian state in order to bring peace to the Middle East.

White House spokesman Ken Lisaius told The Chronicle Friday that the allegation was absurd. "He never made such comments," Lisaius said. He cited a briefing Thursday in which presidential press secretary Scott McClellan also denied that Bush had made such comments at a 2003 meeting in Jordan with Mahmoud Abbas, then the Palestinian prime minister, and Nabil Shaath, then the Palestinian foreign minister. McClellan said he had not been present at the meeting but had "checked into that report."

Abbas, now the president of the Palestinian Authority, and Shaath, now the authority's information minister, both made the comments for a three-part BBC documentary on Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts. On Friday, in an interview for the BBC Arabic service, Abbas said that Bush was merely expressing his heartfelt commitment to peace in the Middle East.

"President Bush said that God guided him in what he should do, and this guidance led him to go to Afghanistan to rid it of terrorism after 9/11 and led him to Iraq to fight tyranny," Abbas said in that interview, according to the BBC Web site. "We understood that he was illustrating (in his comments) his strong faith and his belief that this is what God wanted."

I recall in the past, Bush claimed god ordered him to invade and I always believed this and it kind of surprises me that this is news now but then, the real rulers are taking down Bush now. Gack. Well, not it is top news and Bush is denying it ever happened which is totally hilarious.

His god DID tell him to invade! It is the Devil that is Death, Death that is Death, the iky heart of the Skull and Bones. Duh. I keep telling people to closely examine which gods Bush really prays to but everyone told me in the past, his frat god isn't important.

Well, it isn't in reality---Mother Nature is. And She isn't holding back, is She?

From the Times Online:

Andrew Blackstock, director of the Christian Socialist Movement, said: "If Bush really wants to obey God during his time as President he should start with what is blindingly obvious from the Bible rather than perceived supernatural messages.

"That would lead him to the rather less glamorous business of prioritising the needs of the poor, the downtrodden and the marginalised."

A BBC spokesman said the content of the programme had been put to the White House but it had refused to comment on a private conversation.

Last month, senior figures in the Church of England questioned America’s sense of "moral righteousness" in its foreign policy.

The bishops of Bath and Wells, Oxford, Coventry, and Worcester, said in their report on countering terrorism: "There is no uniquely righteous nation. No country should see itself as the redeemer nation, singled out by God as part of his providential plan."

OK. We can't resist. Time for the best of the best: Monty Python's Holy Grail!

King Arthur:I am your king.
Woman: Well I didn't vote for you.
King Arthur: You don't vote for kings.
Woman: Well how'd you become king then?
[Angelic music plays... ]
King Arthur: The Lady of the Lake, her arm clad in the purest shimmering samite held aloft Excalibur from the bosom of the water, signifying by divine providence that I, Arthur, was to carry Excalibur. THAT is why I am your king.
Dennis: [interrupting] Listen, strange women lyin' in ponds distributin' swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony.

I swear to god, the super secret Bush plan for world domination is to make us all laugh to death.

To return to homepage click here

WHAT HAPPENED AT THAT CRYPT AT YALE

2005-10-06T06:33:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

From the Bayou Buzz:

According to Franklin Graham, the son of evangelist, Billy Graham, “"There´s been Satanic worship in New Orleans. There´s been sexual perversion. God is going to use that storm to bring a revival. God has a plan. God has a purpose."

Time to examine the utterly dark, central issue in America today: how satanism has competely taken over much of our religious community.

This take over has been a complete victory thanks to the mainstream media overlords and their many slaves called "reporters". This active conspiracy is exactly that: a conspiracy done deliberately for nefarious reasons. Namely, to enslave humanity and to elevate themselves eventually into gods. The ruling elite encourages this, nay, founded the main institutions for this deliberately. I know, my own family is at the heart of this, we are some of the founders.

Billy Graham, friends of all the Presidents but disliking the real Christian, President Carter, probably hates Carter, has this thoroughly evil son who looks evil, even. This son grew up watching his evil father service powerful people and now is taking over only he is over the top, not any of this honey gloss daddy poured over everyone.

His attack on the good people of New Orleans is another aspect of satanism. Namely, you pick out someone utterly innocent and then attack them for being satanic while waving a cross at them. The Spanish Inquisition was great at doing this. They were horrible satanists.

Note that devil worshipper Grahams like Franklin don't ever talk about the Skull and Bones or the mystic Owl rituals at the Bohemian Grove rituals which they have attended, both of them, bowing to the Great Owl themselves, for years. Nope. They are silent about all this stuff. Bush openly flashes the sign of the devil and silence from the "Christian" ranks is amazing to hear.

How many Americans know that April 15th is the High Unholy Day for the Skull and Bones at Yale? And why was that day chosen as the day for us all to pay taxes? Hmm? Ever wonder? The magic spell is strengthened when many Americans every year line up until midnight, to pay tribute to the Real Rulers. The Skull and Bones people love this. It makes them feel particularily powerful as they do their rituals to call upon a powerful entity known as "the Devil that is Death, Death that is Death". They swear their puny souls to this entity!

I drew this picture of Bush's invocation of this entity to make it more real, just look at it. Bush made a deal that night at midnight, he lay in a coffin and had to "open his soul" to the Entity which means he fell into the Outer Darkness and met the actual being who is connected to grave robbing and stealing in general. He then bonded with It. It told him all he had to do was help It kill people. He agreed. Being a drunk and a coward, he chose, unlike Kerry, to do it by proxy. The Entity thinks this is way cool. This is why It wanted Bush to marry Laura. She has actual blood on her dainty hands and thus is a perfect mate for him. She evidently feels no guilt in running over her former boyfriend. A perfect Lady MacBeth.

On the left, rationalists refuse to understand the importance of examining the real religion of the right wing. Even when Hitler made his satanic ritualistic stuff obvious with his swatstika emblem, people in Germany refused to understand its importance or meaning. So it is, here. LIke the Nazis, the satanic origins and many threads that bind together "normal" religions to the Dark Side are ignored by the natives who should know better. I have been castigated by other liberal writers over this very topic. Either they yell, "I don't believe you," or they yell, 'It doesn't matter!"

But it matters a great deal. Just like watching the press whitewash Nazi tool, Ratzinger, so they white wash the Skull and Bones and ignore that freaky pyramid on our money, the glaring Eye. Doesn't it look cute in my picture? Gack. Worshipping money=worshipping death. Ask Jesus.

From Yahoo news:

New Chief Justice John Roberts stepped forward Wednesday as an aggressive defender of federal authority to block doctor-assisted suicide, as the Supreme Court clashed over an Oregon law that lets doctors help terminally ill patients end their lives.

The justices will decide if the federal government, not states, has the final say on the life-or-death issue.

It was a wrenching debate for a court touched personally by illness. Roberts replaced William H. Rehnquist, who died a month ago after battling cancer for nearly a year. Three justices have had cancer and a fourth has a spouse who counsels children with untreatable cancer.

We have to petition our satanic ritualist overlords for how we die. Or are born, for that matter. They love granting us the right to die but only on their terms. Namely, they will "forbid" it while doing it to us capriciously, aka the Nazis. Namely, the Nazis talked about being fit, in good health and happy families while murdering the sick, the lame and Jews. The Nazis were big satanists. Note how Nazi-like our right wing is!

O'Reilly has joined the top GOP ministers in calling for the assassination of other world leaders, for example, and just this week, accused our military of the crime of murdering prisoners of war during WWII but cited as proof, a Nazi massacre of American prisoners! And why is this clown still on TV? Huh?

The satanic ritualists love this sort of widdershins work. When Bush babbles like a total idiot, even going so far as to make everything in a speech a trick negative like saying, "Like bin Laden, I too, think every day how to harm America," and Americans not only don't immediately call for Bush's impeachement just for that statement alone, everyone snoozes along. Whoopee. Then again and again, we have proof of his perfidy as he obviously enjoys watching us scream and die horrible deaths, no one revisits the many remarks he has made in the past about how he wants to destroy us, most accept the notion that he "misspeaks" only he does it ONLY on key issues, key words, all having to do with destroying America.

Books have been written trying to explain this. Some think he is merely a psychopath. Others think he has a speech defect. Others wonder if this is due to brain damage or drinking.

Well, it would show up randomly if that were so! But it doesn't! It shows up the same way his smirk crawls like a spider across his face when he "comforts" people or stands on the ashes of thousands of dead office workers.

Now he is placing a woman attached to that satanic ritual murder on the Supreme Court. She belongs to a church that worships hate in Texas. She is part of the conspiracy to allow or enable...Operation ENable Danger...an attack on the World Trade Center, aka, the Tower card in the Tarot.

Just for this alone, she should not only be barred from the top court, she should be arrested. Along with all of Bush's staff that met that day including Shoeless Condi. They are all criminals! So why aren't they being arrested?

When I first heard Condi's testimony before the 9/11 Commission, I was floored. Here is the obvious "smoking gun"! Why weren't they calling for inditments? Why didn't they do anything? Why did they decide Bush and Cheney should not be under oath nor heard by the American people?

Did the entire commission sit with that Devil Duo and chant "The Executioner is Death, the Devil is Death, Death is Death! All hail Satan!"? Why were they not utterly outraged? Why weren't the American people outraged? Bush "won" an "election" against a fellow devil worshipper after this information was revealed. One can only assume many Americans approve of the attacks, wanted the attacks, are happy with the results of the attacks.

From the Washington Post:

CIA Director Porter J. Goss said today he has decided not to pursue disciplinary action against any CIA officers over failures associated with the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

In a statement released by the agency, Goss noted that a voluminous report issued this summer by CIA Inspector General John L. Helgerson in no way suggests "that any one person or group of people could have prevented" the attacks.

Note there will be no outcry from this latest news. The CIA who drew up the August 6th memo were "to blame" according to Bush and his fellow satanists but why punish them? Only punish whistle blowers. There is no outcry from the media mavens, from anyone. I am outraged. But only on the far left is there any rage at all. People tell us, people connected with this nest of satanists, that huge conspiracies can never happen.

Well, they do and they have. This is why Nazis were able to flourish in Germany, for example.

You would think that the downside to praying to the Devil that is Death is obvious. This Devil always gets his due, anyway, so why elevate It? We all die. We all have to pass this Entity. This Devil happens to be Mother Nature's other face. She creates life and she delivers death. Even those Bristle Pine trees that live for thousands of years, these patient, wizzened creatures still die in the end. We all do.

The reason satanists worship the Death side of Mother Nature is so they can have temporary powers over other living things and to use this to either threaten or actually kill. This makes them feel as powerful as Her. She, on the other hand, kills them. But in the meanwhile, they can reap the benefits of theft of life.

A lot of people don't like to hear this, but over eating is part of this scheme. Namely, people who eat massive amounts of living things to either throw it up again or get grossly fat, are doing what the satanists do, consuming life and turning it into something very ugly. Our culture is now a machine to grind up the living ecosystem of the planet and turn it into a mall parking lot. Our appetites and actions are destroying the air, the water, the very lands themselves and Mother Nature now is on a rampage that we released by our own desire to consume all living things: retaliation is here, not because of gay love, not because of dancing or singing or enjoying sex, She is on a rampage against our consuming this planet and turning it into a dead cinder.

From the NYT:

Two teams of federal and university scientists announced today that they had resurrected the 1918 influenza virus, the cause of one of history's most deadly epidemics, and had found that unlike the viruses that caused more recent flu pandemics of 1957 and 1968, the 1918 virus was actually a bird flu that jumped directly to humans.

The work, being published in the journals Nature and Science, involved getting the complete genetic sequence of the 1918 virus, using techniques of molecular biology to synthesize it, and then using it to infect mice and human lung cells in a specially equipped, secure lab at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

Mother Nature can be very heartless. She will patiently construct an ecosystem, it can be beautifully balanced, delicately, all the living parts interact with each other and the planet to thrive. But let any part of this fail or swing out of control and all hell breaks loose.

In our case, we have literally taken over virtually all ecosystems and are crashing them.

From the NYT:

Geologists date this sandstone to 550 million years ago and explain the folding as a result of pressure from shifting faults underneath. But to Mr. Vail, the folds suggest the Grand Canyon was carved 4,500 years ago by the great global flood described in Genesis as God's punishment for humanity's sin.

"You see any cracks in that?" he asked. "Instead of bending like that, it should have cracked." The material "had to be soft" to bend, Mr. Vail said, imagining its formation in the flood. When somebody suggested that pressure over time could create plasticity in the rocks, Mr. Vail said, "That's just a theory."

The satanic Christians need to "believe" this stupid story which isn't really in the Bible since it doesn't define what a "day" is in Hebrew in the first place, is due entirely to the desire to attack living things and consume them because a deliberate misreading of the Bible gives humans permission to consume all living things and spit it out as fecal matter.

The founders of Christianity didn't believe this. They renounced wealth and eating like a pig, indeed, the vomitoriums repelled them and the consuming of living things just to consume and show off disgusted early Christians who believed in sharing and denial. This revives occasionally like with St. Francis, for example. More than one Princess from a royal family, before 1300, starved herself to death in a convent, adoring Jesus all the while.

The first burnings at the stake and inquisitions began in 1250 and escalated as the satanic ritualists took over the Vatican and turned it into the enforcement arm of the ruling class. Even today, especially today, the Vatican squats like a blackwidow spider at the heart of Christianity and has joined forces with American evangelicals praying to the same Devil that is Death, praying for the Apocalypse!

Just like the dark heart of American evangelicism lies slavery and racism, madness and raping children, the Catholic Church protected child rapists, too. As a child who was raped, I assure you, this still astonishes me how people still trust these various religious institutions. How can they? Did Jesus? Heh.

The spiritual quest is fairly simple. You have to stop consuming everything in sight and focus on reality which is painful but fruitful because once one does this, doing the right thing becomes vastly easier.

We don't want to do this, do we? It is much more fun to worship the Devil that is Death.

To return to homepage click here

BOEING AD IS ABOUT THE APOCALYPSE

2005-10-03T14:53:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

This is a real magazine ad. Boeing commissioned it and it, like all other ads, was sent out with approval from someone and it sums up our mess today: we are in the Apocalypse which is a battle to the death between religions and Mother Nature, aka, the Four Horsemen. Remember, not all of them are "war"--one is famine and one is disease not to mention the parts about "heaven opening up", aka, storms.

From the Seattle Times:

"We consider the ad offensive, regret its publication and apologize to those who, like us, are dismayed with its contents," said Mary Foerster, a vice president of communication's for Boeing's military side.

Mike Cox, a Bell vice president, said the ad was developed by TM Advertising of Irving, Texas, and then initially released for publication by his company.

"The bottom line is that the [Bell] people who approved this didn't have authority to approve it," Cox said.

Texas, again. The right wing fundies there are very open about their lust for the "Rapture" and they are extremely obnoxious about their unique brand of "Christianity" which seems to be molded on the same model of the Spanish Inquisition and other moral horrors.

Note that even in our own, boastful ads, we are the demons who bring hell. The Muslims view us as demons and certainly our behavior is that of demented demons. From the Sunday Herald:

Torture of Iraqis was for ‘stress relief’, say US soldiers

By Neil Mackay, Investigations Editor

FOR the first time, American soldiers who personally tortured Iraqi prisoners have come forward to give testimony to human rights organisations about crimes they comm itted.
Three soldiers – a captain and two sergeants – from the 82nd Airborne Division stationed at Forward Operating Base (FOB) Mercury near Fallujah in Iraq have told Human Rights Watch how prisoners were tortured both as a form of stress relief and as a way of breaking them for interrogation sessions.

These latest revelations about the torture of Iraqi detainees come at a time when the Bush administration thought it could draw a line under the scandal of Abu Ghraib following last week’s imprisonment of Private Lynndie England for her now infamous role in the abuse of prisoners and the photographing of torture.

The 82nd Airborne soldiers at FOB Mercury earned the nickname “The Murderous Maniacs” from local Iraqis and took the moniker as a badge of honour.

The soldiers referred to their Iraqi captives as PUCs – persons under control – and used the expressions “f***ing a PUC” and “smoking a PUC” to refer respectively to torture and forced physical exertion.

Many of our troops use various neo-nazi death skull style emblems and designs. This is because we are proud of being brutal, vicious monsters and think the world admires this sort of entity. We make a big thing about being religious and I keep saying, our true religion is the worship of the Devil that is Death and his Executioners. Our Supreme Court is being filled with people who believe in executions and suspensions of our civil rights and no trials, no charges and the Genevea Conventions are this slipperly fluid mass that allows us to torture people.

This is America?

It is. 100%. This is Christianity/Zionism today. This is our true face.

Today, we are killing lots of villagers in Iraq in Operation Iron Fist. We cycled through the names of various ancient weapons like hammers and swords and spears and arrows. Now we are just blundgening them with our fists. Soon it will be Operation 10" Nails or Operation Super Hard False Teeth or Operation Steel Toupee.

Gads.

Al Qaeda has struck again, as they wish, at will, whereever they want. Killing tourists in Bali who come there to carouse and misbehave and act outrageous, forgetting that Indonesia is not only mostly Muslim, they are the biggest Muslim community on earth and worse, are in turmoil not that Americans know about the country-wide riots this week, eh?

So Bush, pumped up from destroying New Orleans, is ready to try to dragoon the world into the Apocalypic battles he has prepared. From the Herald Sun:

PRESIDENT George W. Bush will attempt to rally Americans wavering on Iraq with a speech which his senior aides have said will be "significant".

Faced with raging violence in Iraq, a US death toll fast approaching 2,000 troops and rising domestic angst over the course of the war, the Bush national security team is telling Americans that now is not the time to quit.
They compare post-Saddam Hussein Iraq to failed-state Afghanistan, an anarchic swamp where terrorism found a home, and Al-Qaeda plotted the September 11, 2001 terror attacks.

Bush aides have argued for months it is better to fight the "terrorists" like Al-Qaeda's Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, in Iraq, than on American streets after fresh devastating terror attacks in Iraq this past week.

The administration is now bolstering that warning by fleshing out what they see as the perils in leaving before enough Iraqi troops can be trained to enforce security.

His only significant speech can be, "I resign." Sigh. But this babbling baboonic bubble boy will tell us to tighten our belts, suck it up and go off to die in Iraq for him and his daughters who will help us by sneering at us in unison along with Church dignitaries. Why aren't these clowns fighting their lovely war? Eh?

"If we quit now, we will abandon Iraq's democrats at the time of greatest need," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in a major speech on Friday at Princeton University.

Women older than Condi have died fighting in Iraq. Why can't this pernacious pipsqueak of a woman go? She can fight in high heel boots. So can the twins.

Besides, the Republicans hate democrats! And they hate voting, too. Not to mention the law, the Geneva Conventions and the Bible above all. They hate all of this with great relish, being satanists.

A Newsweek poll released on Saturday pegged Mr Bush's approval rating at a low 40 per cent over public displeasure with the government's response to recent hurricanes and its handling of Iraq.

Sixty-two per cent said they disapproved of the president's handling of the Iraq conflict, up from 60 per cent in a previous Newsweek poll.

Beset by such numbers, the White House has also cranked up a campaign to convince Americans they are winning the war.

"Americans need to know about the gains we've made in recent weeks and months," President Bush said on Wednesday, pleading with members of Congress to pass on evidence of success to their constituents after briefings with his top generals.

So, we are winning. As my photo essay showed, boy, are we ever winning. Why don't all those GOP spawns and their bratty parents go there themselves and relocate in their favorite country? After all, there are over half a million Americans who need good homes and all those McMansions need to be emptied out and filled with Americans who want to live here, not spend all our tax money in Iraq.

I would say, this could be a real rip-roaring program! "Move to Iraq and donate YOUR home to the hurricane homeless!" Super patriotic, no?

Lastly, here is this interesting news that is a last paragraph and not a headline, as per usual in this cluster-fuck media/religious war:

Al-Qaeda's branch in Iraq said in an Internet statement that it had abducted two US marines involved in the offensive and threatened to kill them unless US forces release Sunni Muslim female prisoners within 24 hours.

Um, they have been pissed about this for several days now. I posted a picture about this. No news here about this, like the hunger strike at Gitmo, it is not in the interests of certain people who hate Muslims to publish news like this, certainly not the NYT who can barely bring themselves to utter "AIPAC" and "traitor" in the same universe.

But here it is! We wanted this, we got this. Al Qaeda's training camps are in Iraq, they are on the move, they are winning, they are all over the planet and so far....bin Laden is winning this campaign, hands down, 100%. How Bush will explain this in his stuttering, stupid speech, will be nothing but more amusement to Osama. The attempts to kill him by making him laugh to death continue.

It should be outlawed by the Geneva Conventions.

To return to homepage click here

SAINT RITA THE IMPOSSIBLE

2005-09-21T21:16:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

When I saw the hurricane name list back two weeks ago, it horrified me that "Rita" was one of the names for this is when we learned about the terrible tragedy in the St. Rita Nursing home. The people there drowned, alone and unaided in the end. A terrifying and bitter death. The pictures within that fatal building are nauseating and pathetic at the same time.

Now Rita is joined with the Destroyer and is bringing more destruction down upon us. Two catagory five hurricanes in the same body of water in less than three weeks is amazing. Usually, the energy stored in the water is dischared when a very powerful hurricane stirs up the ocean but not now. The Gulf waters are blazing hot and the sun just threw a goodly bit of energy at us for over a week, one blast after another, my computer was ruined with one of the blasts.

Sometimes there are too many coincidences. The fact that the hurricane has the name of the notorious death trap and is a death trap is...astronomically amazing. It makes one pause and wonder. Hubris. The Gods. Let's look at the history of St. Rita: From the Catholic Encyclopedia

Born at Rocca Porena in the Diocese of Spoleto, 1386; died at the Augustinian convent of Cascia, 1456. Feast, 22 May. Represented as holding roses, or roses and figs, and sometimes with a wound in her forehead.

According to the "Life" (Acta SS., May, V, 224) written at the time of her beatification by the Augustinian, Jacob Carelicci, from two older biographies, she was the daughter of parents advanced in years and distinguished for charity which merited them the surname of "Peacemakers of Jesus Christ". Rita's great desire was to become a nun, but, in obedience to the will of her parents, she, at the age of twelve, married a man extremely cruel and ill-tempered. For eighteen years she was a model wife and mother. When her husband was murdered she tried in vain to dissuade her twin sons from attempting to take revenge; she appealed to Heaven to prevent such a crime on their part, and they were taken away by death, reconciled to God. She applied for admission to the Augustinian convent at Cascia, but, being a widow, was refused. By continued entreaties, and, as is related, by Divine intervention, she gained admission, received the habit of the order and in due time her profession. As a religious she was an example for all, excelled in mortifications, and was widely known for the efficacy of her prayers.

Urban VIII, in 1637, permitted her Mass and Office. On account of the many miracles reported to have been wrought at her intercession she received in Spain the title of La Santa de los impossibiles. She was solemnly canonized 24 May, 1900.

Gaaaa. She prayed for her sons to die and then went off to live a saintly life! Urgggghhh. Shudder. The ancient Goddess Kali would love this woman to death.

She flailed herself and drew blood, a perfect mad woman. She beat herself. Tortured her own body.

How amazingly horrible. You see, many people worship Death. I don't know why, but they do. Then they express amazement when Death comes to collect them and haul them off. Bush worships the Devil that is Death. Note how successful he is, serving his particular entity.

Anyway, a scary lady and a scary hurricane. One problem with modern America is, many people have been migrating towards hurricane alley. They all want to live in the most dangerous places, absolutely live where living is most shaky, like California.

Unlike us hardier folk up north, expecting winter, preparing for winter and enduring winter, the south larks around, happy as a grasshopper until the inevitable hurricane/tornado/ whatever slams in, then they need to be rescued and everything fixed up again and each rebuilding is much more expensive that previous and more people move in and we see a spiral downwards, for we can't afford this endless game.

It is bankrupting us. If we lose two port cities and much of the oil pumping in the Gulf, we are collectively in deep doo-doo. And we already are overdrawing our accounts and what does Congress do?

Voted for more tax cuts. Which will help the upperclasses in the South but will mean we will bleed even more red ink, which will destroy all of America. This is insane as well as St. Ritianly impossible.

I pulled this picture off the NOAA webpage at sunset. The sun shone across the face of the following edge of the eye. I have seldom seen an eye this tightly wound. The clouds are moving so fast around it, they are stretched to the breaking point. No big lumps or castles in the air, they are shrieking along the short leash that pins them to the eye.

Never ever ever have I seen an infrared radar image of a hurricane with the heaviest rain so symetrical. Usually, it is ragged and lopsided, favoring the upper back side of the hurricane, the part that hit Mississippi so hard with Katrina.

This one is amazingly perfect, like the very tight eye. This means, the winds are not only terrific but uniform. A tremendously dangerous storm, I would suggest, much more so than Katrina, even.

All summer, I tracked stories about sea life dying in the Gulf. One day, on the west coast of Florida, residents watched millions of sea animals desperately running away from the Gulf, trying to reach the Atlantic. Crabs were climbing over fish who were shoving each other along with skates and sharks and porpoises all heading in the same direction: away from the northern and western shores of the Gulf.

Creatures still live within the bosom of Mother Nature. Unlike us, they can see disaster coming from afar. They know when to flee, desperation giving them wings.

My grandfather warned me about this. If you suddenly notice fish or ants or geese running around frantically, expect something bad to happen. They can tell.

&spades From the Association of State Floodplain Managers: A must read. A letter last January to Hastert begging him to not fold FEMA into Homeland Security and warning about neglecting flood control works and warns of things going wrong which have obviously happened now.

A must read.

Yesterday, Congress had a session discussing all these pesky catagory five hurricanes hitting us. They were all relieved to learn that global warming has nothing to do with this, this is "normal" (based on data gathered during the time greenhouse gases were already building up rapidly! Ha, of course, this is ignored!) for the oceans, our heatsink/bellweather, to occilate wildly over a 30 year time span.

So we will go on doing wrong what we are doing. Hail Venus, hothouse planet! Here we come!

The stock market is dropping. Oil prices are climbing world wide because we are going to suck up all that oil or else. No rationing for America, by gum! Prime those pumps! Like Cheney said, hang the hospitals (except his, he needs his hospital!) and get the energy flowing to the oil pumps.

I wonder if the media will show pictures of damaged oil rigs after this monumental hurricane blows through? Hahaha. Yeah, right.

That is scary. No one will attempt this, will they? We will see.

And note: China has been hit today with yet ANOTHER typhoon. Isn't that odd? Eh? Or is it normal. I don't think they think that.

To return to homepage click here

INTERVIEW WITH A WATCHER

2005-09-19T08:46:00.000-04:00

Art by Elaine Meinel Supkis

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Now we will go into rather strange and odd territory today. The web is a very interesting place. Within it is parked all sorts of odd and rather amazing if not horrible information, some of it totally false but alas, a lot of it perfectly true. Venturing into these places and talking about these things can be difficult for one seems insane or deluded but alas for America and our entire planet, the Bush family's crown jewels lie deep within the dark muck of the crazier side of the web. Every once and a while the Bush mask slips and they can't really help themselves, their true natures spring forth and we gasp in amazement and then everyone starts saying, "This doesn't matter. Who cares? It was long ago, like yesterday, yeah, they are all JOKING, they don't really mean all of this.

Well, that attitude is dead wrong. As the bodies of dead humans pile ever higher, we have to look at the truth about the Bush clan for this reveals their plans and goals and a lot worse, trust me on this.

Normally, I visit only at night. I am a Watcher. Observing humanity and the passages between the spirit world and reality is what I do, it is my function. To witness and warn.

Thank you for coming today. I appreciate your visits. I had one last night that was disturbing so I expected to see some weird news today on the internet and certainly enough, here it is.

From the Gainesville.com of Florida, a regular newspaper

Gov. Bush & his mystical buddyAfter more than an hour of solemn ceremony naming Rep. Marco Rubio, R-West Miami, as the 2007-08 House speaker, Gov. Jeb Bush stepped to the podium in the House chamber last week and told a short story about "unleashing Chang," his "mystical warrior" friend.

Here are Bush's words, spoken before hundreds of lawmakers and politicians:
''Chang is a mystical warrior. Chang is somebody who believes in conservative principles, believes in entrepreneurial capitalism, believes in moral values that underpin a free society.

''I rely on Chang with great regularity in my public life. He has been by my side and sometimes I let him down. But Chang, this mystical warrior, has never let me down.''

Bush then unsheathed a golden sword and gave it to Rubio as a gift.

''I'm going to bestow to you the sword of a great conservative warrior,'' he said, as the crowd roared.

The crowd, however, could be excused for not understanding Bush's enigmatic foray into the realm of Eastern mysticism.

We're here to help.

In a 1989 Washington Post article on the politics of tennis, former President George Bush was quoted as threatening to ''unleash Chang'' as a means of intimidating other players.

The saying was apparently quite popular with Gov. Bush's father, and referred to a legendary warrior named Chang who was called upon to settle political disputes in Chinese dynasties of yore.

The phrase has evolved, under Gov. Jeb Bush's use, to mean the need to fix conflicts or disagreements over an issue. Faced with a stalemate, the governor apparently "unleashes Chang" as a rhetorical device, signaling it's time to stop arguing and start agreeing.

No word on if Rubio will unleash Chang, or the sword, as he faces squabbles in the future.

What do you think of this?

Perhaps you should call on Geronimo to talk about this. The Bushes use his skull for magic ceremonies which they used to do at the Skull and Bones crypt at Yale but had to remove it when it leaked out that their cult had it illegally. Grave robbing is illegal. Museums do it all the time. It isn't right.

I'd rather not. He comes only with lightning bolts. I already have enough trouble with my computers going down thanks to energy surges. Normally I call upon anime stars to explain or joke about these things but every once and a while, I feel the need to warn people about this stuff, the black magic, that the Bushes do. As you well know, I don't think it is a joke or silly or has no consequences.

We both know even stupid teens and ditzy actresses playing with the occult is very dangerous. The top political family in the USA doing this can be fatal to all humanity. They can kill everyone if they continue to invoke the powers of the Demons. Look at them! Do they look or sound sane? Do they look like honest Christians? Why do they belong to so many magic cults that pretend their devil worship is a joke? Can't people figure out, this is a deadly game?

People call me names and tell me to not take all this seriously, dear Watcher. As you well know. We both used to be visited by and talked to the FBI in the past because they needed information that only we had, to solve crimes like the Oklahoma City bombing.

I remember how you dropped the dish you were washing when the news broke, breaking the dish. You yelled and the phone rang and it was some agents in DC calling, asking for more information.

Yes, they visited, too, didn't they? *sigh* There were other times, too, but after 9/11, they never call, never visit. No matter if I email them information or call, dead silence. Readers on the darker side of the web know that our guardians are no longer working to save America. Like a cancer, fear and traitorous thinking pervades Washington now which is why absolutely everyone connected with protecting Americans failed utterly when the hurricane hit. So many died that they were happy to say, "only around 10,000 are dead," and they want everyone to ignore this or heaven help us, be pleased it wasn't a quarter million like in December, overseas.

We are glad Jeb Bush, father of a family of degenerate, criminal children, has finally named his demon. "Chang" could be anyone but I believe that this refers to a famous (evil) monk, here is some data about him: From History and Philosophy via Google:

Shaolin priests spent an average of 10 years behind Temple walls in a strict regimen of work, mediation, practice and study. Their day started at sunrise and ended at sunset. Graduation from the Temple consisted of three tests. The first was a difficult oral examination of Chinese history, martial arts theory, philosophy and healing. The next was full-contact sparring matches with several Kung-Fu masters, and the last was the Ordeal of the Lohan Hall.

The Fukien Province monastery contained the 36 chambers or levels of martial arts' instruction and the infamous Lohan Hall (also known as Priest-Scholar Hall and Den of the Wooden Men). Upon entering the Lohan Hall, the graduate student fought 108 mechanical wooden dummies armed with knives, spears and clubs triggered by the student's body movements. If the student survived, they had to make their way through an opening blocked by a 5OO-pound metal urn containing red-hot coals. Gripping the urn in their forearms, the student had to slide the urn to create an exit. In the process, he branded his forearms with the badges of the Shaolin master, the Dragon and the Tiger.

In 1768, the Manchus again saw the need to destroy the second Shaolin Temple. They sought the allegiance of Chang Sanfeng, a sung dynasty scholar and outstanding student of the Fukien Temple. His superior physical and mental abilities allowed him to graduate from the temple a full-fledged master in less than two years.

A Taoist, Chang Sanfeng left the temple to start a monastery in Hubei's Wu Tang mountain range. Here he created Wu Tang Martial Arts, merging the hard arts with the mystical Chi Kung (Internal Power) arts. This led to the creation of T'ai Chi Ch'uan, "The Grand Ultimate Art," of which, one account reports, Chang Sanfeng as the acknowledged founder. Sanfeng created T'ai Chi Ch'uan as a combat art after seeing a snake defeat a hawk, later discovering its health and fitness benefits.

Sanfeng's revolutionary internal power building techniques and promise of increased fighting ability attracted many students to him. Manchu officials encouraged the rivalry between the Wu Tang disciples and the Shaolin. After many clashes the more peaceful Shaolin monks left looking for areas of peace to live, study and teach. The Fukien Temple was eventually burned to the ground.

Shaolin monks moved to India and Southeast Asia. Some remained, posing as tradesmen, farmers and artists. Certain Shaolin monks started the infamous Triad Society, a group that began as political movement and later fell into criminal activities. Others settled on Ermei Mountain in Szechuan Province, an area that developed many martial styles.

I know you can see clearly where the "power" that Jeb Bush seeks to obtain lies. Note how the peaceful Shaolin temple was destroyed by a conspiritor who entered under false premises, took all the secrets and preverted them to the State, to serve against the People, to suppress and destroy them! This drove the Shaolin into the Darkness and they, too became part of the Evil. All Yang all the time.

Alas, to take the high spiritual powers of peace and love and to harness it to the Darkness, to drive across a carpet of corpses, to stand upon smoldering ruins holding thousands of innocent dead, crowing, did you see the anniversary ceremony at the WTC just before Bush goaded everyone into the illegal invasion of Iraq? Wow. It screamed "Black Magic".

Yes, I remember you warning everyone, and being mocked. We see this over and over. When Babs Bush said the family's favorite musician was a Black Sabbath practitioner and heavy drug abuser, everyone laughed. When the Bushes flash the sign of the devil at important time markers, everyone laughs and they giggle and say, they are doing the "longhorn" which is, alas, still an occult symbol. So typical of Texas, by the way.

It did amaze me, growing up, seeing how many adults around me were doing black magic spells even as they tried to laugh it all off, yet look at the history of Jack Parsons, the man who brought my father into the rocket community before WWII. He was part of a very real coven. He founded the Jet Propulsion Labs in Devil's canyon which is where he and my dad used to set off rockets in the late 1930's. He and I have some very unfortunate and obscure connections. *shudder*

He lost his top security clearance over that stuff. And then, after the Russians got hold of enough rocket data to scare DC into action, they took on Nazis and occultists to "save America" which they did...by arming it with so many nuclear/hydrogen bombs and missiles, set on a hair trigger, they can kill every last human in one day! Amazing. Still, Americans trust these people. I cannot fathom it.

Yes, I raged about this all my life, since childhood. Thanks for helping me out. Just this last week, sneakily, Bush and his co-religionists snuck in a provision "allowing" them to use nukes preemptively on anyone who "is a danger to America". Shades of Doomsday!

The Chinese won't let them. They want the earth intact and their people alive. But then, rereading the history of the Shaolin Temple and you wonder. Can they do it?

Looks like the Chinese got America and North Korea to bury the hatchet. I suspect, this is because Bush had to beg for more loans thanks to Katrina. From Xinhuanet:

The six parties to the Korean Peninsula nuclear talks adopted a joint statement here on Monday, in which the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) promised to abandon all nuclear weapons and existing nuclear programs.

The statement says the DPRK is "committed to" abandoning "all nuclear weapons" and "existing nuclear programs" and returning, at an early date, to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards.

The United States affirmed in the document that it has no nuclear weapons on the Korean Peninsula and has no intention to attack or invade the DPRK with nuclear or conventional weapons.

The fourth round of the six-party talks was held in Beijing in two phases, from July 26 to August 7 and from September 13 to 19 respectively, involving China, the DPRK, the United States, the Republic of Korea (ROK), Russia and Japan. Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Wu Dawei chaired the talks.

The six parties held, in the spirit of mutual respect and equality, "serious" and "practical" talks concerning the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, says the joint statement.

The statement says the six parties agreed to take coordinated steps to implement their consensus in a phased manner in line with the principle of "commitment for commitment, action for action."

They also agreed to hold the fifth round of the six-party talks in Beijing in early November this year at a date to be determined through consultations.

Everything is going as I expected. The Chinese are the new rulers of the planet, they have secured all their borders and now have their greatest enemy on a very short leash. But they don't control everything, do they?

An old saying in my world: "If you keep a large, rabid dog on a short leash, you may die of rabies." This sense of control is very tenuous. America can still bring down the entire nuclear arsenal on everyone's heads. Mutual assured destruction doesn't work with demons.

This is, after all, their Master Plan! This is, after all, their Goal!

Yes, you warned me back in 1972 to "beware of the Fool with the Crown and the Sword," didn't you? I wish America would be afraid of this menace but alas, the usual things work as always, appeals to vanity and wealth and power overwhelm good sense and the voice of Angels. I note that many American churches are filled with people who want not only for Jesus to love them but to make them rich and powerful.

None of which passes through the Gates of Death. Only the soul may enter, naked. Not so much a scrap of paper, a pin, passes. They all worry about their immortal souls yet sell them in an instant for scraps of green paper. Sad, isn't it?

Which takes us back to the fate of the Shaolin Temple and the great loss there, the spiritual loss that still lies there. Thank you for your time, Watcher. Hope to see you again, I guess.

I am aware that you view me with mixed feelings. But what I do is what I have to do. That cannot change.

To return to homepage click here

DEVOUT DOG PRAYS FOR HARMONY

2005-09-17T20:57:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The very first animal to show us affection and love was the dog. During the great catastrophe of the howlingly cold, bitter Great Ice Ages, they came to our campfires and caves and merged with us so completely, our way of living has been forever altered by their pack politics, their attentive devotion.

That is right! Hi, everyone! Even cyberdogs are loyal, loving and want bones and a warm bed! I love dog stories! Continue on, I am all ears!

&hearts The story of Hama, the devout Buddhist dog, is circling the globe. I worship in a Buddhist Temple where Temple dogs and cats roam. So this is cute, very cute: From Chosun news, South Korea:

A dog at a small Buddhist temple on Jindo Island, South Jeolla Province has attracted a substantial following by performing Buddhist rites. Hama, a one-year-old Jindo dog at Buljang Temple, has won the hearts of Buddhists over a month of performing the "Yebul," a ceremony paying respect to a Buddha image, alongside the monks. The Ven. Buksan of Buljang Temple said, "We keep about 30 Jindo dogs, but we were able to train Hama, who is especially smart, to do simple things, and now, he can perform the Yebul... I wonder if he had some connection with the Buddha in a previous life."

Japanese temples are guarded by dogs who sit in attentive stony silence, carved ears perked up, waiting for summons, forbidding demons.

&hearts Here is the famous Hachiko statue which stands near the Shibuya station in Tokyo. From Japantoday:

Shibuya is known today as a popular gathering point for Tokyo' young people. But long before loose socks and sandals with three-inch soles, before Tower Records and 109, Shibuya had another claim to fame: Hachiko.

The year was 1925. Every morning, Professor Ueno Eizaburo walked to Shibuya station accompanied by his loyal dog, Hachi, nicknamed Hachiko. Hachiko didn't accompany his master to his teaching job at the Imperial University (now known as Tokyo University), but when Professor Ueno returned every day at 3pm, the dog was always at the station waiting for him. However, on May 21 of that year, Ueno died of a stroke while at the university. Hachiko went to Shibuya as always to meet his master, but 3 o'clock came and went, and the professor didn't arrive. So Hachiko waited. And waited.

The Akita must have known something was wrong, but nonetheless he returned to the station every day at 3 o'clock to meet the train. Soon people began to notice the loyal dog's trips made in vain to meet his master. Ueno's former gardener, the Shibuya stationmaster, and others began feeding Hachiko and giving him shelter. Word of his unaltered routine spread across the nation, and he was held up as a shining example of loyalty. People travelled to Shibuya simply to see Hachiko, feed him, and gently touch his head for luck.

The months turned to years, and still Hachiko returned to Shibuya station daily at 3pm, even as arthritis and aging took their toll. Finally, on March 7, 1934 - nearly ten years after last seeing Professor Ueno - the 12-year-old Akita was found dead on the same spot outside the station where he had spent so many hours waiting for his master.

Hachiko's death made the front pages of major Japanese newspapers. A day of mourning was declared. Contributions poured in from all over the country to memorialize the dog that had won the hearts of the nation. Sculptor Ando Teru was hired, with the money that had been contributed, to create a bronze statue of Hachiko. In April 1934 it was placed on the exact spot where Hachiko had waited for so long.

The statue took some damage from the WWII firestorms but survived and this too, renewed faith in our faithful companions.

The dogs of New Orleans are still being reeled in along with some very unhappy cats. The owners of these pets worry about them even as they themselves struggle to survive.

Our hearts go out to all of them, all.

To return to homepage click here

GOD AND THE NATURE OF NATURE

2005-09-16T22:43:00.000-04:00

Art by Elaine Meinel Supkis

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

More than once this year, we got to see Mother Nature's dark side. Again and again, She has shown us how She can annihilate everything in Her path with a mere flick of Her wrist. Time and again, humans have responded by throwing themselves to the mercy of other gods, all of whom are as feeble as ants under foot at Her feasts of death.

From the NYT:

Earlier today, President Bush prayerfully commemorated the victims of Hurricane Katrina and offered the hope that opportunity and prosperity, especially among those long marooned in poverty, would rise from the grief and ruins.

Mr. Bush, speaking at services on a national day of prayer and remembrance, said: "We commend the departed to God. We mourn with those who mourn. And we ask for strength in the work ahead."

The morning after pledging a huge federal government role in rebuilding the stricken region, the president invoked "the Creator of wind and water" in an address at the National Cathedral.

Years ago, I have noted that whenever Bush utters the word, "death," he smirks. This revelation so startled some reporters, they actually wrote a story about it all back in 1999 at my suggestion, back when reporters still talked to me.

At the 9/11 funeral service in DC, Bush squirmed in his putrid pew and looked all around, acting like a little boy. He didn't run off to his potty but he looked like he could barely contain his precious fluids. It was quite noticable. Dignity is a stranger to that man.

As an executioner who chickened out of war himself, he is an odd one. He loves the Devil that is Death but pretends, successfully, thanks to the media, that he is a Christian. Odd, isn't it, talking about "the Creator of wind and water" and think about how often Bush denies Mother Nature Her due. He fights Her at every turn. He wants to pollute and destroy our entire planet. And then worships the Creator?

Creatrix!

The president, who has remarked often on his own Christian faith, touched upon what is for believers an eternal mystery: that nature is without feeling but nature's God is an endless fount of compassion.

"Through prayer, we look for ways to understand the arbitrary harm left by this storm and the mystery of undeserved suffering," Mr. Bush said. "And in our search, we are reminded that God's purposes are sometimes impossible to know here on earth. Yet ever as we are humbled by forces we cannot explain, we take comfort in the knowledge that no one is ever stranded beyond God's care."

Acknowledging that the winds and flood had inflicted their worst harm on "the elderly, the vulnerable and the poor," Mr. Bush said the hardships, however unwanted, offered an opportunity. "This poverty has roots in generations of segregation and discrimination that closed many doors of opportunity," he said. "As we clear away the debris of a hurricane, let us also clear away the legacy of inequality."

Monster. He is pure evil. The poor and elderly died, not to mention the babies---because they had no means of escaping the hurricane and those who made it impossible for them are...Bush and his governance.

Mother Nature didn't keep the victims in St. Rita's pinned down that day. They were stranded there by Bush's cruel policies!

If someone throws a box of kittens into the river and they drown, the river didn't kill them. The killer is the one who threw them in. Throwing the disabled and poor into the path of a violent storm is the same thing.

"The Creator of wind and water," Mr. Bush said, is the source of "a love that can redeem the worst tragedy, a love that is stronger than death."

Kind of late to smear one's love around, Bubble Boy. It would have meant something if it happened before August 30th. Of course, the love he craves is love for himself. To be let off the hook.

Why don't the Skull and Bones guys pray to the Creator of wind and water? This is a very pertinent question. Since they worship death and use coffins and laugh about the devil and parade around with magic numbers and call themselves Skull and Bones, geeze, sounds so Christian, doesn't it?

Invoking a theme he also sounded in his address on Thursday night from New Orleans, Mr. Bush said: "Through this tragedy, great duties have come to our nation. The destruction of this hurricane was beyond any human power to control, but the restoration of broken communities and disrupted lives now rests in our hands."

That stupid sleezebag.

We DO control many things and our direct actions are now being translated into catastrophes of greater and greater horror. We can flee hurricanes but only if we have transportation. Elderly in wheelchairs or strapped in hospital beds can't flee hurricanes. Neither can the poor who had exactly ZERO emergency housing opened to them, the Super Dome was very grudgingly opened at the last minute and only after enough people expressed horror and outrage that the poor were going to be abandoned utterly.

&spades Here is a typical example of how Bush and his gang deal with natural disasters. From the Clarion Ledger

Federal officials appear to be seeking proof to blame the flood of New Orleans on environmental groups, documents show.

The Clarion-Ledger has obtained a copy of an internal e-mail the U.S. Department of Justice sent out this week to various U.S. attorneys' offices: "Has your district defended any cases on behalf of the (U.S.) Army Corps of Engineers against claims brought by environmental groups seeking to block or otherwise impede the Corps work on the levees protecting New Orleans? If so, please describe the case and the outcome of the litigation."

Cynthia Magnuson, a spokeswoman for the Justice Department, said Thursday she couldn't comment "because it's an internal e-mail."

Shown a copy of the e-mail, David Bookbinder, senior attorney for Sierra Club, remarked, "Why are they (Bush administration officials) trying to smear us like this?"

The Sierra Club and other environmental groups had nothing to do with the flooding that resulted from Hurricane Katrina that killed hundreds, he said. "It's unfortunate that the Bush administration is trying to shift the blame to environmental groups. It doesn't surprise me at all."

Federal officials say the e-mail was prompted by a congressional inquiry but wouldn't comment further.

Blaming the very people who are trying desperately to stop the unfolding disaster is typical. Shoot the messenger! Environmentalists didn't cut the funding for the levee repairs, for example. They didn't hire Brownie although Bush and his gang want everyone to think that Lieberman (another American who puts a different nation ahead of this one, alas) chose and hired Brownie!

&spades Finally, going back to the whole coffin thing: From Online Journal

Service Corporation International (SCI), the largest funeral services provider in North America, implicated in scandals in Texas and Florida, recently learned that one of its subsidiaries is negotiating a lucrative contract with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to remove dead bodies in areas ravaged by Hurricane Katrina.

SCI paid $100 million to settle a class-action lawsuit several years ago alleging the company desecrated thousands of corpses, and dumped bodies into mass graves.

Moreover, the company paid $200,000 to settle a whistleblower lawsuit that sought to expose that two members of the Texas funeral commission, the agency which regulates the funeral industry, were actually employees of the company they were supposed to monitor—an obvious conflict-of-interest.

In the civil matter, which took place at two Jewish cemeteries in Florida, the plaintiff's attorney said that Service Corporation International of Florida, Inc., a subsidiary of SCI, secretly broke into and opened burial vaults and dumped remains in a wooded area where the remains may have been consumed by wild animals.

Seriously, I wonder if the Bush gang gets first dibs on the skulls. I thought, back in 2000, when the May story broke, Bush would be sent home to daddy. But they bribed Ms. May out of court to shut up. LIke Bush's girlfriend who got a very illegal abortion to kill his baby, silence is truly "golden".

Additionally, SCI of Florida buried "remains in locations other than those purchased by plaintiffs; crushing burial vaults in order to make room for other vaults; stacking remains rather than burying them side-by-side; secretly digging up and removing remains; secretly burying remains head-to-foot rather than side-by-side; secretly mixing body parts and remains from different individuals; secretly allowing plots owned by one party to be occupied by a different person; secretly selling plots in rows where there were more graves assigned than the rows could accommodate; secretly allowed graves to encroach on other plots; secretly sold plots so narrow that the plots could not accommodate standard burial vaults; secretly participated in the desecration of gravesites and markers and failed to exercise reasonable care in handling the plaintiff's loved ones remains

Isn't is odd, haha--not-- that the grave scandals were concentrated in Florida and Texas, the Bush duo's joint back yards? And both were caught up in all this via bribes?

Well, welcome to corrupt America, where every grave is a chance for the Skull and Bones Bushes to get rich or get more stuff for their odd religious practices!

To return to homepage click here

SANCTITY OF MARRIAGE

2005-09-07T22:24:00.000-04:00

Cartoon by Elaine Meinel Supkis

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Well, the old beat up sour puss of the Opus Dei Court has died and will be replaced by a sneering young prune faced man. Meanwhile, in California, the legislators passed the wonderful gay marriage bill...at long last! Extending normal civil rights to yet another minority even as minorities in New Orleans, and there are plenty of gays there too! As well as assorted ethnic and religious groups, in California at least, some people are finally being allowed to live normal lives without living within the narrow confines of religious bigotry.

Schwarzenegger just announced he will veto it. Why?

Seriously, does this serial adulterer in the serial adulterer party, the GOP which stands for "Grope or pester" party, is worried about his marriage collapsing if two gay guys can have a civil relationship? Huh? Do the marriages of the slimeballs in the GOP teeter so precariously that they need to forbid others the pleasures of matrimony simply because they can't stand being married, themselves?

Gads, look at the Bush family. The family that brings cooties together from across the planet! When the GOP tried to impeach Clinton for getting a blow job, I assumed it was because he got it for free, she even brought the pizza! And he didn't get any itchy brain draining diseases, to boot!

What puzzles me greatly is, what the hell difference does it make if two men or two women kiss and hold each other dear? Are they setting a bad example? Would an honorable marriage make those Potemkin marriages so dear to the GOP, moot?

Or are they tempted to do the same? Is this why so many of them seldom reproduce? Are pregnancies the times the males succeeded in getting it on? How on earth did Bush Senior get his bizarre partner with seed? By spitting them out from squeezed grapes?

And so the days pass and Schwarzenegger, after finishing his classes in "How to not be a total Ass" now will go back to starving his wife to death.

To return to homepage click here

DO-IT-YOURSELF RELIGION

2005-08-21T18:58:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Today, a rich, wrinkled old man left his palace to tell people about religion. From the BBC News:

The Pope told the crowds there were dangers in people finding their own religious routes.

"If it is pushed too far, religion becomes almost a consumer product," he said.

"People choose what they like, and some are even able to make a profit from it.

"But religion constructed on a 'do-it-yourself' basis cannot ultimately help us," he said.

"Help people to discover the true star which points out the way to us: Jesus Christ."

OK. Um, hate to tell Mr. Pope this news but Jesus was this guy who was the ultimate "do-it-yourself" dude. He also like to do the religious shopping thing what of taking all sorts of odds and ends from paganism and turning it into his own toys, for example. Like Christmas. Pure pagan, stolen by the Christians and used for commercial reasons today!

Then there is Oester. You know, the sun goddess's high holy day, taken away. Midsummer celebrations, the fall Equinox, Halloween, all the Great Days, taken by the grabby Church that latched onto wells and mountain tops and ancient oak trees and fair meadows that were all dedicated to all sorts of gods and goddesses.

Geeze. Christianity became all about solar/lunar events which is weird since it supposedly was about this guy, you see, who decided to make up his own religion. He took the story of Dionysius, for example, and claimed to turn water into wine and walk on water and make fish appear magically. What? That is what a religion is about? Instant fish and watery wine? Huh?

The Pope also called upon the Muslims to be peaceful so the Christian crusaders could steal all their oil. This isn't going to work. I assure you. If Jesus could turn water into oil then the Christians could stay home and make oil magically but alas.

The Church can only make wine into blood. Gack. That rip off of Dionysius is rather vampiric, isn't it?

Well, if Jesus came back like he threatens to, we can expect the Pope to dress him down for trying to create his own religion.

To return to homepage click here

POPE YOUTH RALLY

2005-08-15T09:17:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Some of the religious people I admire the most are the wonderful Franciscans and Clares. The founders of both orders were truly Christians who loved not only Jesus but all living things, plants and animals included. They sprang up at the same time the Dominicans did. The Dominicans wanted to use torture and kill anyone who disbelieved or disobeyed the Pope. Day and night differences, no?

I know which group Jesus would have joined.

The present Pope has a very checkered past, to say the least. His mealy mouthed excuses for his Hitler Youth days are shown to be evasions. Just look at him. He wears that lovely expression cartoonists use to show evil leaders lusting for power. Just like Bush's continual smirk or Mussollinian chin ups, as a cartoonist using photos, it is laughably easy to find evil looking pictures of powerful men, they suit this medium perfectly.

From the BBC news:

Pope Benedict XVI has said he hopes his forthcoming trip to his homeland Germany will give "new impulse" to the Roman Catholic Church in Europe.

In an interview with Vatican Radio ahead of the trip, the Pope said there was a widespread idea that "Christianity is composed of laws and bans which one has to keep".

Well, under Jesus, it was all about sharing and loving and turning the other cheek, three things nearly all Popes knew not. Far from it, they all choose, even "saintly" ones like the previous occupant, to live in a giant palace. I remember when the previous Pope came out on his balcony, surrounded by servants, to lecture us on the godliness of poverty. I was living in a tent and was sorely tempted to go to Rome and evict him from his palace and move him into my tent.

This present Pope wants us to follow his laws and bans but note how he protects adulterer priests and priests who hide child rapists!

He said this was often seen as "something toilsome and cumbersome".

"I want to make clear that it is not a burden to be carried with great love and realisation, but it is like having wings," he added.

"It is wonderful to be a Christian with this knowledge that it gives us a great breadth, a large community."

Asked what the ideal aim of the festival in Cologne was, Benedict answered that ideally, it would spark "a wave of new faith among young people, especially the youth in Germany and Europe".

Well, I am not a Catholic and I really am agnry with this Pope and his many minions working to force me to live under many bans and restrictions and toils. If he wants to live like this, go right ahead. His many followers can imitate him. No one is stopping them. They can look at it this way: they will go to "heaven" while we will all go to "hell" and guess where I want to be?

Heaven is where your friends are. Hell is where people you don't like are.

To return to homepage click here

THE BIRTH OF PEGASUS

2005-08-12T10:26:00.000-04:00

Original art by Elaine Meinel Supkis

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Tonight we will see the spectacular show, one of the oldest shows in the memory of humanity, the amazing Perseid showers. The stars will rain down upon our heads all night long and this year is going to be a memorable show indeed.

From Space.com

For as long as records exist, the Perseid meteor showers have always been strong. This summer's Perseid shower will be exceptional. The moon is mostly out of the way later in the night, and higher-than-normal activity rates are expected over the United States.

The Perseid shower's parent body, comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle, is notable in being a comparatively huge comet in an orbit that passes close to Earth's orbit frequently. It measures 24-31 kilometers in diameter, 2 to 3 times the size of comet Halley, and is so big that the continuous ejection of water vapor and dust during its approach to the Sun does not move the comet much off course. It has spewed dust for at least 5,000 years and most likely thirty times longer. It has built a massive meteoroid stream, most of which is located just outside of Earth's orbit. Earth passes through the outer regions of that stream in July, and hits the center on August 12.

This giant possible annihilator object rains down upon us bits and pieces of its great bulk. If it were to hit us, we will all be gone, all of us. And pretty much all others, too.

While humans evolved, their brains grew. And when they were ejected from the Garden of Eden, the great swath of jungles that girded Africa, once we walked on the hot plains, along the vast sea shores, we looked up in wonder at the cloudless skies, the dark starry nights and we wondered. And during this time, a great comet flew past. The fear of God was born.

Some of the earlier myths and stories revolve around this cosmic wonder. When we look into the path of the falling stars, they seem to radiate out of one spot and this is where they get their names. The Perseid showers come from the great grouping of stars that make up the Pegasus sector. All these diverse constellations are from the same story, according to Greek mythology.

Perseus was sent to slay Medusa, one of three sisters who were cursed into becoming monsters. When he whacked off her head, out of her torso, with the flow of red blood, sprang Pegasus, the Iku, the Square of Paradise between the two Rivers, Pisces. Pegasus is really a very old god, older than Perseus. He was called Zug in ancient Ur. Half snake, half flying horse. The Greeks chopped off his lovely long snake tail and gave it to Medusa. This is why we see Zug as a half horse today. Astronomers in classical Greece then gave Medusa's tail to Andromeda. She even got one of the stars of the Great Square.

Because of these showers and the fact that the largest star in the Perseus constellation is a variable red star, this star ended up being called the Evil Eye and is Medusa's head. Falling stars were catastrophes which is Greek for falling stars. Actually, they are right, you know.

Falling stars do fall on us. With devastating power.

AFP/NASA-HO/File Photo: This November 2000 NASA file image shows a meteor streaking across the sky during the...

Here is an example of a particularily large piece burning up in our stratosphere. Which, by the way, is getting thinner, thanks to our manic consumption of various chemical/fossil fuel combinations.

From Seattle Times:

The incidence of two forms of nonmelanoma skin cancer has more than doubled among people younger than 40, particularly women, an increase scientists attribute to tanning's continued allure and Earth's depleting ozone layer.

Heck, this is killing the amphibian world, big time.

From Space.com:

The midnight sky flashed an eerie blue early Thursday over four Midwestern states as a meteorite exploded in the atmosphere, sending rocks as big as softballs crashing through some houses.

Residents in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Wisconsin reported seeing the disintegrating meteorite flash across the sky about midnight. Police were soon deluged with reports of falling rocks striking homes and cars.

One guy had it hit his office and it destroyed his printer but missed the computer.

From the Durango Herald:

NASA continues to use Meteor Crater as a proving ground, even to test spacesuits for the human exploration of Mars.

Scientists guess that a meteor only 150 feet wide excavated the massive cavity, meaning that it had to be traveling at over 30,000 mph before impact. The explosive force of the collision was greater than 20 million tons of TNT.

The little bit of meteor that did not vaporize on impact either broke off as it plummeted through the atmosphere or was ejected miles away by the force of the impact.

150 feet in size left a sizeable crater, didn't it? Compare that with 31 kilometers! This is a small rock compared to the Mother Rock, isn't it?

The Arizona Planetary lab's meteor damage calculator says the other side of the planet barely noticed the meteor that hit Arizona. But let's put in the numbers for the Perseid meteor!

According to the data, if this ever hits us, it will be the biggest hit since the creation of the earth. Kind of scary, no?

All this stuff comes from outer space which isn't empty but rather, thanks to the mighty black hole grinding away in the center of our galaxy, a giant vacuum cleaner sucking up matter, we see the shattered remains of even older stars, older worlds, showering down upon us.

This is why we figured out how to pray to the Gods. For they do live in the Heavens. And are both beautiful and very dangerous. They created us and will eventually destroy us.

To return to homepage click here

ADULTERY

2005-08-11T21:15:00.000-04:00

Painting by H. Bosch

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The Catholic Church along with all sorts of churches and other orgnanizations, all want to tell me how to have sex and etc. These nosey, crummy fakes want to shove me around while they screw around behind their velvet curtains.

Once again, one of these lying, hypocritical idiots gets caught red handed. From the NYT:

A Roman Catholic monsignor named in court papers as ''the other man'' in a divorce case resigned Thursday as rector of St. Patrick's Cathedral, the New York archdiocese said.

Cardinal Edward Egan accepted Msgr. Eugene Clark's resignation from the key church position despite the 79-year-old Clark's denials that he has been carrying on an affair with his 46-year-old private secretary, the church said.

''He offered his resignation for the good of Saint Patrick's and the Archdiocese,'' the statement said. ''He will not be celebrating Mass or the sacraments publicly until this matter has been resolved.''

Clark has been rector of St. Patrick's in midtown Manhattan since 2001 and has often celebrated Mass there when the cardinal was away. A strong proponent of traditional morality, he blamed the church's sex-abuse scandal in 2002 on ''the campaign of liberal America against celibacy.''

Clark was named in divorce papers filed last week in Family Court in White Plains by Philip DeFilippo, 46, who claimed that a private investigator taped his wife, Laura, and the monsignor entering and leaving a Long Island hotel last month. The videotape was shown Monday to New York City newspapers.

DeFilippo also claimed that the DeFilippos' teenage daughter was exposed to the relationship.

A call to Clark's lawyer, Laura Brevetti, was not immediately returned. Laura DeFilippo's lawyer, Michael Berger, said he would not comment on Clark's resignation. Both lawyers have previously denied that the monsignor and his secretary had a sexual relationship, accusing Philip DeFilippo of distorting an innocent event.

Archdiocesan spokesman Joseph Zwilling had said Wednesday that Clark was not asked to step down as rector because unlike priests who were accused of molesting boys, he was not accused of anything illegal and was denying the allegations.

Shades of Karl Rove! He wasn't "breaking the law", he was only busting up marriages! Holy matrimony! Geeze. Now you tell me, who are the idiots running around America screaming we must put the 10 Commandments all over the place?

Obviously, these same bonzos can't remember any of them unless it is tatooed on each other's foreheads. Oh!

I forgot, buggering boys isn't forbidden by any commandments from their God! So that must be why they did it. Alas for them, it is illegal under secular laws! But breaking the "thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife (and oxen! Hands off of my Chip and Dale team!)" is A-OK. Women get stoned to death all over the world for this but Catholic priests can do it because they don't covet the wives, they merely borrow them. In between chasing choir boys, of course.

The Nazi Ratzi Pope wants to purify his putrid clergy except he doesn't, he wants me purified. Well, listen to this, you horny old rat infested fools: I don't want your dirty hands on my body or the body of any women in America, hear? Keep it to yourselves. No one will investigate your sex lives in the Vatican. You can screw around to your heart's delight there.

Just stay out of my life. This is a warning.

To return to homepage click here

VACATION MONTH

2005-08-10T17:39:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The daily death toll rings a bronze clang, the voice of the dying, a whisper on the hot winds that chase dust devils across the blighted land. At home, Bush is on vacation. He sits in his airconditioned house and is flown in and out by helicopter, those black helicopters the right wing so fears fly him in and out of his New World Order Headquarters.

A mother sits by the side of the road, a Fury incarnate. A daily reminder of the spectre of the night when the dead whisper into unheeding ears. The media notices her now. When nearly a million of us demonstrated loudly in DC before the war was launched, banging drums, shouting, singing, ringing bells, the entire news media managed to miss this. They all sent news crews to cover the demonstration...only if it failed.

But it was a great success and I watched as the media folded their circus tents two hours before our march was scheduled to begin.

The media can't ignore the whispering voices of the dead. Today, like the other days this week, more soldiers were killed and killed more Iraqis. In this death duel in the sun, the bodies are rotting. Today, the dead come from the unit based in my neighborhood. The 42nd Infantry Division is based in Troy, NY, which is very near to my mountain. Five were blown up and they made a brief headline, too. It amazed me because up until this week, the dead were buried deep inside of various innoculous headlines.

Perhaps the news media is playing catch-up with public opinion now 61% against this war.

Here is a story of a man who is just beginning to see he is in for a lifetime of suffering. This is much better than dying but still heart breaking. From the Washington Post:

"So we're driving down the road and it's midnight, so it's pitch-black, and when you're driving at night, you don't use any lights," says Terry Rodgers, "but we can see fine because we've got night vision goggles."

He's sitting in the living room of his mother's townhouse in Gaithersburg, telling the story of his last night in Iraq. He's still got his Army crew cut and he's wearing a T-shirt with an American flag on the chest.

"We're driving down this road and there's this tiny bridge over a little canal," he says. "They had rigged up this bomb and they had a tripwire running across the bridge and we hit it and it blew up."

Like the rest of the 13,877 Americans wounded in Iraq, Rodgers has a story to tell. He tells it in a matter-of-fact voice, like he's talking about making a midnight pizza run or something. He's sitting in an armchair with his right leg propped on an ottoman, the foot encased in a soft black cast that reaches almost to the knee. His crutches are lying on the rug beside the chair.

"The Humvee finally comes to a stop and the right side is just torn apart and I hear my squad leader screaming, 'I think I lost my arm!' And my best friend Maida was in the front passenger seat where the bomb went off and he was screaming, 'Where's help? Where's help?' And then he went quiet.

"And me, I'm trying to crawl out of the Humvee and I get most of my body out and just this leg is stuck and I thought it must be caught on something in the twisted metal. I look back and I see it's just laying there on the seat, so I'm like, 'Why is it stuck?' So I try to lift my leg up and it won't lift. I just had to pick up my leg and crawl the rest of the way out."

He mimes the action of picking up his leg with his hands, then he continues the story.

"I started patting myself down and that's when I noticed that my face took some shrapnel," he says. "It was all swollen on this side, so when I'm patting myself down, my middle finger went, like, this deep into my cheek where the shrapnel went in."

He points to a spot about halfway down his finger, showing how far it went into the shrapnel wound behind his right eye, which is still pretty much blind, unable to see anything but bright light.

"Then I started checking out my leg. I knew my femur was broken, but at that time I didn't know my calf was missing," he says. "And that's when I hear my best friend Maida and he started heaving."

Rodgers takes a few loud, quick breaths to show what Mark Maida sounded like.

"And he breathes like that for a few seconds and then he just stops. And that's when he died."

Just four months ago, most of the stories about the wounded were about how even amputees wanted to rejoin their buddies and continue fighting. How they were happy to see Bush and wanted to fight and fight some more.

This was all propaganda, of course.

It seems Bush wanted to visit this soldier only he said no to him and to the other chickenhawks who wanted him to pose for photo ops to show they cared when they obviously don't give two pennies for any of his thoughts. Newspapers and TV still avoid showing the half dead: the people in comas, the ones with no faces or thoughts, the insane, the suicides. Every month, some kill themselves. If they are still in Iraq, they get counted. If they are discharged, they don't get counted.

Many after the Vietnam and Desert I wars killed themselves, either directly or via other means. The suffering caused by fighting eats at the soul. Quite a few family members go down with their loved ones when they go mad.

"It didn't do anything to us Americans," he says, "but it killed a few civilians."

Most days, Rodgers's platoon would patrol the town in Humvees, then set up a TCP -- traffic control point -- where they'd stop cars and search them for weapons. Or they'd do "house calls": "We'd pick random houses and just go in and search 'em." Sometimes they'd do a "dismounted patrol," which meant they wandered through the streets on foot.

"We'd have an interpreter with us and we'd try to talk to people," he says. "We didn't have any incidents when we were out walking. The biggest incident we'd have on foot patrol is we'd be mobbed by little kids asking us for candy. When people from back home would send me candy, I'd always give that to the kids."

Occasionally the Americans would hear about a house where somebody was rumored to be storing weapons or building bombs. They'd wait until dark and raid the place.

"It was very intense and very fast," he says. "We'd try to be as quiet as we could until we got to the front door, and then you just have the battering ram and you open the front door and you run in yelling and pulling your weapons and try to gain control of the house as fast as you can."
Other patrols found illegal weapons on these raids, but Rodgers's never did.

"We did hit the wrong house quite often," he says. "We had these overhead maps, satellite maps, and when you're on the street in the middle of the night, it's hard to find the right house. In those instances, we'd say, 'Sorry,' and give 'em a card with a phone number to call the Army and we'd pay for the damages."

You know, we rebelled against England because of this sort of thing. Why can't we understand how noxious this is?

Evidently, the people setting the bombs and those ambushing the Americans most likely were recruited from homes we randomly attacked.

This is a picture from the 42nd's web site. They have several showing them luring very small children over to get goodies. Many children have died this way because small children don't know better, they don't know that approaching heavily armed soldiers who are fighting their families is very dangerous. We play Santa Claus during the day and at night, we play the Grinch who Stole Christmas.

Here is another picture showing a soldier in full battle gear, luring small children to his side. This isn't a quiet city with our soldiers lightly armed, walking around. He is on a military vehicle and is primed to fight. Alas.

This desire to clothe ourselves in sheep's wool is why our soldiers are dying. We want to be loved but we also love to have our own way which is why the dissonnance of our candy for tots combined with destroying their homes and crushing their toys at night can't be reconciled.

There is not one picture of a teenage/military age Iraqi with the Americans except for pictures of the soldiers we are "training." Guess who knows where we are patrolling and how many are out and at what hour we will be abroad?

Cindy Sheehan, the mother of one of the fine young and old American citizens who has died in Iraq, sits in the hot sun in Crawford, patiently waiting for Bush to drive by. Bush flies in and out of his private Waco using helicopters. She is a trip wire he doesn't want to trigger.

To return to homepage click here

HIROSHIMA

2005-08-06T22:34:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

On a mountain top near my own mountain is the Grafton Peace Pagoda. The Japanese nun who founded this pagoda walked around the world, praying until she came here and created this beautiful monument with the unstinting labor of many wonderful volunteers.

Everyone poured their hearts into this. Because of the nukes that fell on Japan. Since world peace rests entirely in the hands of the United States whose military spending and weapons dominate the planet yet control very little of it, we and we alone are responsible for creating and protecting all of humanity...from our own rage.

After 9/11, when we had the sympathy of the world we turned it into sympathy for the devil.

We could have led the people on earth in the right direction but instead, the right led America into the wrong direction. Every step we take down our chosen path is bloodier than the one before yet we are compelled like sleepwalkers to move ever forwards. Each day brings news that doesn't surprise me.

Sadly, everything I fretted about and so many of us in the cyber realm warned about, comes true, relentlessly. All the worst imaginings are fulfulled in full. But underlying all this is the odd and frankly insane notion that Americans are "young and naive." This ardent belief of our own infantallity has fatal consequences. For we don't take an adult's responsibilities seriously.

"Live within your means," our parents warned us yet even as our parents live and breathe, they as well as we, all refuse to do that. Collectively and idividually, we all live as if there is no tomorrow. And yet, there is a tomorrow. And we know, in our souls, that we must build and weed the garden and draw the water, day after day, for life is an accumulation of many small, sometimes nearly invisible, actions.

Mother Nature can and has swept aside our works and our lives just as She demonstrated so brutally last December. Even today, typhoons and floods are snatching away the lives and homes of many people and we know these things can and will happen to us, here, too.

This is why the most important thing we can do is live our lives so we are spiritually ready to die, for you take nothing, not even family, with you when you pass the Gates of Death. There is one thing you can take.

Your soul.

And so, by shedding tears of pity upon the millions of dead women, men, children and babies who have died in past wars and will die in future wars, we weed our own gardens of the heart and despite feelings of anger and despair over the direction our country has stumbled, we must hold out hope that we can turn the tide, courage and love, to get everyone to heave our nation into the right direction again.

September 24th we will go to the Capital to show our strength, our energy and our will. We will tell the world and those who think they thwart us, that we are united and we are not to be stopped or ignored, we are the PEOPLE of the UNITED STATES of AMERICA.

I will post more about this demonstration as time passes.

To return to homepage click here

ANIMALS MOURN

2005-07-25T20:23:00.000-04:00

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

For many eons there has been debate about whether animals can feel pain (!) or if they can mourn the death of a loved one or remember the past. Many humans cling to the notion that only we do these things. This is so we can brutalize animals and not feel guilty about it.

When people claim they can see the feelings of animals, the Aristotleans scoff. Aristotle was the ancient Greek philosopher who wrote extensively about many things, often quite wrongly, he being a man of his times, unable to see how trapped his mindset was, due to his cultural upbringing.

Debate has raged and still rages. The cruelties of modern farming are an extention of the belief that animals don't feel anything much so who cares what happens to them.

I am not of that school of thought.

Today, Molly, our oldest horse, a very sweet and charming old mare, died. I knew something was wrong when she and her consort, Sparky, didn't show up at the paddock gate looking for apples. I called. From far away, the geldling trumpeted. Sparky, you see, is a "proud cut" which means he acts very much and looks like a stallion but can't impregnate a mare.

Today, his call was filled with alarm. He charged out of the old barn and gallopped up the mountainside to me, neighed with all his vigor and turned tail, running back to where he came. I ran after him. He ran back out to see if I was really coming, then ran back into what used to be Molly's old stall.

She was lying on the ground, utterly still.

Sparky neighed to her. He nuzzled her and then stomped his feet and looked over his shoulder at me. I crouched next to her and saw she would rise no more. "I'm sorry, Sparky," I said, sadly. He blew up and ran outside and running in circles, he vent his rage. He followed me to the new stalls. There, I fed him, but he kept looking down the mountain. As soon as he finished, he roared off across the fields covered with wildflowers to stand guard over his fallen mate.

I must bury her tomorrow. It will be hard on Sparky.

He isn't unsual.

Chip and Dale were America's largest ox team. They appeared on TV. They lived fewer years than Molly who was nearly 30 when she died. Chips, the bigger ox, died on the cusp of the Millennium, at midnight. I sat out in the iron cold hard field with him where he fell and broke his hip, holding his head, his huge horns resting on either side of me. Dale, who worked in team with him since they were calves, stood next to us, lowing sadly as his brother struggled to breathe.

When Chips died, we had to dig a huge pit for him. When the time came to bury him, we used a huge crane to lift him into it. As soon as the first shovel of dirt hit his body, Dale blew up.

Swinging his horns, he bellowed at us and rushed at the operator moving his brother's body. I wrapped my arms around his head. "Dale, come with me, come, now, come, boy," I sang to him. Lowing pitifully, he hung his head and followed me away. Later, he spent the day, standing on the grave, tears running down his broad cheeks. Finally, I took some grain to him and said, "Let's go home." He then moved into his brother's stall. He never set foot into his own stall again.

I know tomorrow is going to be hard on Sparky. I will have to tie him up. He won't let me move Molly, that is certain.

When my great English Mastiff, Cleo, was dying of cancer, it was two years after Chips died. It was the middle of winter. Cleo dragged herself to the front door. It was snowing. She indicated to me, she wanted to go outside and so I dressed up and followed her. She dragged herself to the darkening woods. It was very quiet except for the plopping of snowflakes upon the soft white mantle that covered the land.

When animals are dying, they go off to be alone.

Out of the dim light came first the cats, all four of them. They sat around Cleo in a circle. One of them rubbed against her for she loved to wash them but she was in too much pain to respond. She sighed. Then the neigh of Sparky who came trotting over with Molly at his heels. By then, Dale, the ox, came ambling over. Colleen, the sheep herding dog, nuzzled her pal, Cleo.

"Shush, all of you, back into your houses!" I said and I herded everyone away and then went back to Cleo only she was right behind me, dragging herself through the snow. She didn't want to be left alone, after all.

The next day, she died.

Colleen was desolated. She refused to get out of bed for three days. Finally, I took her to visit the pound...where she met her new friend and this is how we adopted Coco, a lovely elderly Newfundland who was going to be put down. She lived with us for several years.

Well, it isn't only mammals! We had a turkey hen. She couldn't hatch her own eggs so she took one of the duck nests and hatched a duck egg. The little duckling was a riot. He would scamper onto his mother's broad back and ride her around. She cooed and petted him and loved him.

And one day, stepped on him.

I knew something was wrong. She made a giant fuss. She wanted me to fix him. When I picked up the limp body, she became enraged for a minute but I sat down and showed her I couldn't bring him back. She followed me into the kitchen, still wailing away.

It was hard, disposing of him. Sheep: whenever something went wrong with the flock, the two matrons, Curly and Stella would baaa with alarm and go off and seek me out, even going so far as to banging on the door. When giving birth, the mothers all looked forwards to my arrival. They would huddle next to me and I would sleep on my plastic folding chair in their birthing hall. Scientists were "surprised" to find that sheep show anxiety when a bad person they don't like shows up and their chemistry shows happiness when they see a smiling face and hear a cheerful voice. "Lambies, come to me," I would sing to them and all the heads would shoot up and off they go, looking for me.

When Jane Goodall started studying the chimpanzees, many scientists were angry about how she talked not only about them but with them. She learned their language and signals and she can charm any chimpanzee she meets. All greet her with relief and joy, even, the happiness of being with someone who understands them at last, inexpressible.

People who believe animals can feel usually believe that people can feel. This concept is the bedrock of liberalism. Caring not only for one's self but reaching across to other humans and other living things is what a true life is all about. I firmly believe that when we all die, we are judged by those we showed mercy to in life.

The scales of justice are held in the hands of a wise being who knows what is within our hearts and can see it all, even things we try to hide from ourselves.

I am a predator. I have blood on my hands. But I also took care of those creatures who passed through my life. Even when I ate my turkeys, they had a very good life. Food and shelter and fun, freedom and joy. They had a great time. My hens lay eggs for me and I eat them. But they live a good life, free and happy, coming to me willingly when I call them.

Even though Sparky likes to object when I harness him up, he still enjoys himself, it is all just a ritual. He hates being ignored. He is going to be difficult now. He lost the love of his life, the girl who smote him the minute he laid eyes upon her, as I led her up the mountain, he ran alongside the fence, neighing to her. When I put her in the opposite pasture, he gathered up all his strength and bounded over the fences and dancing in front of her, flexing his huge neck, his long tail streaming in the wind as he ran, he took her and she, the wall flower mare, blossomed. She discovered that no man or anything could touch her without Sparky's permission.

When dogs attacked her, Sparky drummed them into the dirt. When lightning flashed, Sparky would defy it, standing brave with his chest into the wind, ears back. When it snowed, Sparky would make paths for her and trample down the deep snow. He was a pig, though, if I gave them apples, he always wanted all the apples. But then, no one is perfect.

Love and live, everyone. It is the best we can do.

To return to homepage click here

THE NEW YORKER TALKS TO RATZI

2005-07-22T12:52:00.000-04:00

Way back, last spring, I read in the NYT that the new Pope was an old foe of mine. And that he blamed me for driving him out of Tuebingin and turned him, like a witch waving her wand, into a conservative.

From my earlier article:

But while his deep reading and thinking in theology, philosophy, and history were fundamental to development as a theologian, it was the protests of student radicals at Tübingen University - in which he saw an echo of the Nazi totalitarianism he loathed - that seem to have pushed him definitively toward deep conservatism and insistence on unquestioned obedience to the authority of Rome

We met, we argued and I terrorized him so badly he decided to be a Nazi. Amazing! Will wonders nevercease. Actually, the reason we argued and I was "vulgar" was because he was already a Nazi and this ticked me off greatly! I can spot a Nazi from pretty far away.

The article details his humilation at my hands...ahem. He was oh so learned and could quote anyone but I was there and there was precious little for me to quote since most literature is anti women's rights! So we got in a classic fight over "this is MY body that I live in and YOU can't order me around" stuff. Then I accused him of being "Kinder, kuchen, Kirche" Nazi. That was so mean of me he decided on the spot to be come a Nazi. I suppose.

I decided to write to the New Yorker because their article, unlike the NYT one, doesn't detail the final meeting in the Neue Halle where I drove the future Pope batty. It only says "It is not clear why he fled Tuebingen and became conservative". Heh. Unlike the more honest NYT headlines for their story.

Of course, the NYT was lying, too, for as I pointed out in 1968, Ratzinger was no liberal.

To the Editor,

In "Reading Ratzinger," Mr. Grafton says, "It is not clear what opposition (Ratzinger) encountered (in Tuebingen). but it is certain he responded to the radicals with a radical change of course of his own."

The New York Times interviewed the new Pope last spring(April 24, 2005 "Pope Benedict XVI: Roots of Conservatism; Turbulence on Campus in 60's Hardened Views of Future Pope). He described to the reporter how he was confronted by students on a specific day in a lecture hall and we literally chased him away. He mentioned in particular, a (female) student who called him a Nazi at his last appearance there.

I do believe am that person. I remember the theologian, as well. I was fighting for women's rights, previously, in America, and in 1968, I was a student in Tuebingen for one year when we had the fateful confrontation. Many articles like to gloss over the Pope's past but he couldn't hide from me. My father, Dr. Aden Baker Meinel, was one of the top OSS/ONI officers in Germany at the end of WWII and he was one of the first high ranking officers to enter Dachau in 1945 and the present Pope happened to be one of the people guarding the village of Dachau when he fled at the approach of our army and his family still lives really near Dachau and my father's rage and frustration with the people living near by as he struggled to figure out what that concentration camp was doing is famous because he kept demanding, "How could you possibly ignore this place? Why are there so many dead people here?"

They all pleaded innocence due to total incuriosity. My father said this was ridiculous because he could smell the camp from far away. It made him ill.

I accused Mr. Ratzinger of being an unreformed Nazi because he scolded me for being a feminist radical. His "Kinder, Kuchen, Kirche" beliefs was stuff straight out of the Nazi philosophy.

This debate shocked everyone, they assured me he was a liberal. I countered hotly, auf deutsch, of course, "If he is a liberal then he should support women's rights!"

This included in particular, the right to birth control.

Rather than debate me further, he fled the lecture hall. I won that round. Well, here he is, coming back into play, using the Church to try to imprison me in my home and take away my civil rights here in America. He was never really a liberal and he certainly isn't one today. I will fight him and his army of reactionaries tooth and nail. I challenge him to continue our debate. I will even fly to Italy and argue in the Vatican if he is too scared to meet me on my own ground.

Thank you,
Elaine Meinel Supkis

All the papers and magazines seem bent on making pretty-pretty with this petty tyrant. They are very gingerly with him. Well, I didn't like him back then and I loathe him today. I hope they give me at least some voice in this whole matter. It obviously bugs the hell out of the Pope. I will note, he was happy to talk about this back in April and much less forthcoming today. He knows I have challenged him to a debate. He knows I am out there and watching him.

He knows he will lose a debate with me. No one is better able to talk about the grim subject of fetuses than I. I have no sense of embarrassment concerning the blood and gore of concieving, carrying and delivering babies.

To return to homepage click here

SIEGFRIED'S DEATH MARCH

2005-07-05T17:44:00.000-04:00

Last week's funeral for German war dead. Unlike our hidden funerals, full pomp and ceremony on national TV.

The carnage continues in Afghanistan and Iraq. One of the casualties in Afghanistan were German soldiers. They were buried in a great ceremony last week. Unlike the American funerals which are kept off the front pages and out of the general populace's eyes.

The Germans have a great deal of experience with military funerals and many soldiers' deaths. We barely had any in WWI, the Germans had a great number of lives literally blasted away just like the Brits and French. This was certainly true in WWII, also.
Americans mocking living people who survived WWI and WWII and lost many loved ones as "surrender monkeys," and so on, is just another sign of how juvenile and ill mannered we have become thanks to more than a century of being sheltered from the true horror of war.

I found the German pictures of their funerals most interesting because so very little has changed in the last 200 years.

The neutral black/red/gold post WWII national flag, deliberately designed to be utterly uninspiring, has regained the Imperial Eagle first seen on the war shield of Emperor Frederick I of Germany back in 1200 AD.

From the Imperial College of Heraldry, the Coat of Arms of the Holy Roman Empire.
Well, well, well, isn't that the Holy Roman Imperial coat of arms draped upon those coffins in Germany? These symbols come back again and again. For once, there was no eagle defiant! When Frederick II, Wonder of the World, struggled for power with the Popes, losing in the end in 1250, his banner had the spread eagle and when he went down along with all his Hohenstaufen sons, legal and bastard, the coat of arms died with him.

When Prussia reunified Germany for the first time after the interregum, the namesake of the earlier incarnation, Frederick the Great of Prussia, again, took up the old coat of arms and defiantly replanted it on German soil.

The Imperial and Royal Coat of Arms of HI&RH Prinz Karl Friedrich von Deutschland, Herzog von Swabia, de jure Kaiser Charles VIII of Germany, Or a double-headed eagle displayed sable armed, membred, beaked and haloed Or, langued gules ( Holy Roman Empire )charged on the breast with an inescutcheon Or an eagle displayed sable, armed, membred and langued gules, beaked and haloed Or,( Kingdom of Germany )charged on the breast with an inescutcheon Or there on three lions passant inpale sable armed and langued gules ( Duchy of Swabia ).

One on top of the other, the various incarnations of eaglehood and at its core lies the ancient emblem in its full blood red fury.

The American eagle harkens to all this history. This is why Benjamin Franklin was not happy about the choice. The Founding Fathers tried to make the eagle less cold and dark by lightening it up, using the bald eagle with its white head and having it carry olive branches in one claw. From Great Seal.com

(Franklin's letter concerning eagles rampant) "For my own part I wish the Bald Eagle had not been chosen the Representative of our Country. He is a Bird of bad moral Character. He does not get his Living honestly. You may have seen him perched on some dead Tree near the River, where, too lazy to fish for himself, he watches the Labour of the Fishing Hawk; and when that diligent Bird has at length taken a Fish, and is bearing it to his Nest for the Support of his Mate and young Ones, the Bald Eagle pursues him and takes it from him.

"With all this Injustice, he is never in good Case but like those among Men who live by Sharping & Robbing he is generally poor and often very lousy. Besides he is a rank Coward: The little King Bird not bigger than a Sparrow attacks him boldly and drives him out of the District. He is therefore by no means a proper Emblem for the brave and honest Cincinnati of America who have driven all the King birds from our Country . . .

"I am on this account not displeased that the Figure is not known as a Bald Eagle, but looks more like a Turkey. For the Truth the Turkey is in Comparison a much more respectable Bird, and withal a true original Native of America . . . He is besides, though a little vain & silly, a Bird of Courage, and would not hesitate to attack a Grenadier of the British Guards who should presume to invade his Farm Yard with a red Coat on."

Oh, do I know turkeys! Wild turkeys, bronze turkeys, raised them, interacted with them.

They are slow to boil but the red invades the bald head until it is bright blood red, the chest grows tremendously with air inhaled, the head cocks back, the tail spreads and then the turkey will literally fling himself upon humans, cars, lawn mowers and even old shoes. Not gobbling, that is for other turkeys, no, it is the "Piff piff!" of snorts of rage. A red stripe can create this monster bird. A red flag waving. Yes, turkeys are most appropriate, especially for the crew running America today. They are not eagles that lust for battle, they are barely turkeys.

I have seen fiercer Chickadees.

The Germans in particular have created mythos/impulses that are extremely warlike, the music, the culture. Wagner, anyone? Think you can resist his allure? I grew up on Wagner. I have fought in recreations of medieval battles. I know the ersatz romantic feeling of bloodlust. Sword in hand, in full steel armor, standing on a hill, contemplating the developing fight, charging into the fray, joyously.

I have ancestors who invaded England. And we still got kicked out (and I suppose the feeling was "good riddance", no?)

A good 500 years, thrashing around, killing each other, being cruel to the natural residents of that fair isle....we were actually grateful to find relative peace in America in between our wars and insurrections and invasions on this continent.

Back to Germany: America, anxious to run an empire without dying in battle, seeks to rearm Germany, and begs Germany to reunite Europe into one entity, holy or not. And we seek to rearm another dangerous foe, Japan! Like Germany, religion and ancient lineages converge to make a dangerous mix.

What saved us in WWII was the fact we didn't goose step. The co-ordinated crump of thousands of steel clad heels striking the cobblestones in unison as thousands march together, stiff legged, a uniquely German achievement I hope we never have to witness again. We slouched into Europe and explained to everyone, we didn't want to fight all that much, we wanted to finish our business and go home.

Yet here we are, fighting foes in Iraq and Afghanistan who want us gone and want our militarism and God Bless Americanism and screaming eagles and shock and awe gone. Period. We can't stomach the bloody mess needed to goose step around the planet waving imperial flags!

Thank god...I hope.

From the Albany Times Union:

Army Specialist Stephen Z. Madison, 23, a native of Corinth, was found dead in his home at Fort Riley, Kansas, late last week. Madison was recovering from burns he suffered while serving in Iraq last fall.

Although he was still under treatment for his burns, he was not hospitalized at the time of his death, his father, Stephen R. Madison said today. Stephen Madison's wife, Mary, found her husband unconscious in their home on the army base.

During his second deployment to Iraq, Madison was scalded while taking a shower, suffering severe burns to his left arm and torso. His father said he was scheduled for another operation to his left arm this summer to give him better mobility.

Madison enlisted in January 2001, a "spur of the moment thing'' that was a surprise to his family, his father said. He was assigned to the 82nd Medical Company and repaired Black Hawk helicopters, his father said.

Suicide. One of many, alas. A normal human. He thought, perhaps, the gory glory of the eagle rampant would be romatic.

It is a deadly thing, this bloody bird. It rips millions with its beak and feels no mercy, no love. It just wants to be fed.

To return to homepage, click here

ATHEISM IN NEBRASKA

2005-07-05T09:21:00.000-04:00

Socrates put to death for being an atheist.

An alert has been put out across the left spectrum of the web to grab a story and pass it on. In Nebraska, a slightly possible swing state, the march of the far right wing treads heavily upon the earth. They work endlessly and mindlessly to undermine the wall separating Church and State, desperately trying to conflate the two so they are one, indivisible, unfightable.

The insecurity of Christian ideologues forces them to pave over secularism so they can be comfortable in their private delusions.

This latest battle shows clearly why they are dangerous to democracy and the Constitution. From the New Nebraska Network:

Today, the Omaha World-Herald went ahead and revealed in a front-page story the name of the plaintiff in "ACLU Nebraska and John Doe v. the City of Plattsmouth," the local variant on a series of court cases nationwide challenging the constitutionality of displays of the Judeo-Christian Ten Commandments on public property.

They'd been itching to pull the trigger on this one for some time, getting into quite the verbal and legal battle with the ACLU over their planned revealing of "John Doe's" true identity. The ACLU lawyers in the case claim to have faced incredible harassment from the public themselves and wanted to shield their client from such pressures, including potential death threats.

After the World-Herald's uncovering the identity of "John Doe", the ACLU sought a court injunction to prevent them from publishing this information, but the effort failed. Ever since, the ACLU has been a frequent target of pithy editorial comments for their supposedly hypocritical attempt to impugn the rights of a free press by fulfilling their duty as lawyers protecting their client.

At the time, the World-Herald promised they only wanted to serve the public interest - not endanger anyone - while questioning the ethics of anonymous lawsuits that seek to influence public policy. Well, obviously, as evidenced by today's story, it serves the public interest not only to know the plaintiff's name but also to see his picture and that of his license plate. Otherwise, why would the World-Herald run these photos?

This is how the right operated in pre-Nazi Germany. They would target individuals and then proceed to harass and intimidate and even assassinate them. This public lynching style was done for years, earlier, in America. Cut a minority out of the herd and then make and example of them, violently and in the open.

Poor man. For someone who claims to have already "had threats to firebomb my house, to have my son beaten" this has to seem like a contract on his and his family's lives. Is this really the treatment one deserves for standing up for something they believe in against the majority? Pretty damn despicable of the World-Herald if you ask me. Shame on writer John Ferak, photographer Jeff Bundy, and the whole damn outfit for showing such a complete lack of sensitivity.

Hopefully, the good people of Plattsmouth will show more concern and compassion, keeping this battle in the courts where it belongs.

What's most pathetic about the World-Herald's running this article today, though, is actually its lead editorial which has the audacity to demand a federal shield law that protects the identity of anonymous sources in the press.

How hypocritical is that to reveal the identity (and so much more) of a man afraid for his life on the same day they demand reporters be exempted from ever being forced to reveal such things in a criminal investigation. Talk about a power trip - the World-Herald wants to be judge, jury, and executioner...above the law in every way.

The mainstream media is in full bellow...trying to protect Karl Rove from prison for sneakily outing an undercover CIA agent in an attempt at muzzling, intimidating and frightening off a Bush critic who was challenging the ruler's excuses for an illegal war.

Their inability to understand why the reporters must talk to the prosecutor and why anonymous plaintiffs in unpopular lawsuits should be protected is a deliberate trick designed to fool people. If that doesn't work then they wave the flag and yell "God Bless America."

I have something very personal in this fight. My grandfather, Edison Pettit, was born in 1889 and was named after the inventor of the light bulb, Thomas Edison. He was born in Peru, Nebraska and went to college there and ended up teaching first at Washburn College in Kansas before going to the Yerkes Observatory (my birth place) where he met my grandmother, Hannah Bard Steele.

He left Nebraska for professional reasons, of course, but the main thing is, he became an atheist back then and this led him down the path of discovery to explore new worlds and to try to understand the mysteries of the universe without the blinkers and blindness of faith. Atheism and science go hand in hand. Even people who profess to be religious secretly hold doubts if they are true scientists.

In my own life, I have discovered various tests of scientist's ultimate faith for when I begin to discuss the origin of time/space and the paradox of impossibility of existence and the implications of what if the universe is collapsing due to increasingly deep gravitational pools and other fundamental stuff, if they wax enthusiastic with the discussion and are eager for more or to refute me, I know they can "think". If they cut this off and pretend none of this really matters, who cares? Then they are probably insecure or incurious (or bored, heh).

Socrates was forced by the Athenians to commit suicide because he asked too many questions that had a bearing on assumed religious modes. All great empires and cultures end up crushing dissidence and atheism to maintain a grip on power and to control minds and bodies so humans will willingly feed the Machine without questioning too closely what its purpose really is.

One side effect of killing off or intimidating or harassing atheists is, it kills scientific inquiry. One can see this across the Midwest as feebleminded monomental people try desperately to undermine the teaching of modern science. To keep humans separate from living things requires destroying the biological sciences and the information pouring into the astronomical world undermines the earthcentric, homosapiencentric universe and it, too, must be destroyed. Just as Catholic Spain destroyed the humanities and sciences during the 1600's reign of terror, or Galileo being forced to recant his own observations concerning the planets and the sun, truncating scientific inquiry has a downside: those who succeed end up being left in the dust, technologically. Poverty and loss of power follow close behind.

My grandfather left Nebraska and not only never came back, he seldom mentioned the place. It held no fond memories for him. He died in Tucson, his own observatory next to his bedroom. I used to live in it because when we moved him home with us, we ran out of bedrooms so I moved outside, nearby.

The Midwest complains about the loss of people. My grandfather's own town has half as many residents as in his youth and it is significantly worse off. Anyone with any gumption or talent leaves. And they don't go to some nice, Christian, intolerant, viciously patriotic place, they head for California or the big cities just like my grandfather left. And they don't come back, not even to visit, often.

Spreading this blanket of woe across the nation already is driving off people. Young scientists from abroad are rethinking the wisdom of relocating to America to study.

This is why the anonymous fight of the atheist in Nebraska is our fight, too.

FORGET THE 10 COMMANDMENTS The GOP Ignores Them Everyday

2005-06-27T11:01:00.000-04:00

The Supreme Court ruled against P2P file sharing. Those of us who use this stuff, a moment to reflect on the fragility of the web. But also the Supreme Court ruled on the 10 Commandment hoopola run by the right wing Christians.

They lost.

From the Associated Press:

In a narrowly drawn ruling, the Supreme Court struck down Ten Commandments displays in courthouses Monday, holding that two exhibits in Kentucky crossed the line between separation of church and state because they promoted a religious message.

The 5-4 decision, first of two seeking to mediate the bitter culture war over religion's place in public life, took a case-by-case approach to this vexing issue. In the decision, the court declined to prohibit all displays in court buildings or on government property.

In a stinging dissent, Justice Antonin Scalia worried publicly about "the dictatorship of a shifting Supreme Court majority."

Can't right wing jerks get their stories straight? They eke out the tiniest wins on the barest of majorities, if that, if they fail, the tyranny of the barest majority on the Supreme Court stops the vote counting so they could install Bush, they then crow that they are in the majority so we have to endure whatever bozo bumbling bashing they do and when once in a blue moon we get a ruling that is sensible, they complain about "dictatorship....of the majority."

Well, sorry to tip your canoe and your tailor, too, buddy. If you and your right wing ilk hate us so much, move. Like move to Iraq and create minority rights there! Heh. Prove your manhood and go!

Git.

I was furious in the sixties when we were told to love America or leave it. I always would say, "Well, the troops love America, right?" and they would agree. "So shouldn't they be in America if they love it?" This is when they would try to run off to yell at some other hippie chick.

"The touchstone for our analysis is the principle that the First Amendment mandates government neutrality between religion and religion, and between religion and nonreligion," Justice David H. Souter wrote for the majority.

"When the government acts with the ostensible and predominant purpose of advancing religion, it violates that central Establishment clause value of official religious neutrality," he said.

Souter was joined in his opinion by other members of the liberal bloc — Justices John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer, as well as Reagan appointee Sandra Day O'Connor, who provided the swing vote.

In his dissent, Scalia argued that Ten Commandments displays are a legitimate tribute to the nation's religious and legal history.

Government officials may have had a religious purpose when they originally posted the Ten Commandments display by itself in 1999. But their efforts to dilute the religious message since then by hanging other historical documents in the courthouses made it constitutionally adequate, Scalia said.

In his dissent, Scalia blasted the majority for ignoring the rule of law to push their own personal policy preferences.

Now these creepy people who really hate the 10 Commandments, look at how they live their miserable, lost lives!---are trying to make our courthouses into museums of legal history. Well, OK with me! The cuniform slab of Hammurabi should sit square in the middle! Not to mention the Magna Carta and the Constitution itself. The "separation of church and state" could be engraved over the Judge's chair! After all, the Constitution trumps all these religious/historical laws.

The Constitution is the Law of the Land, after all.

Ten Commandments displays are supported by a majority of Americans, according to an AP-Ipsos poll. The poll taken in late February found that 76 percent support it and 23 percent oppose it.

76% of all Americans break one or many of these commandments regularily. Why they want to be reminded of their renegade life choices puzzles me. Perhaps it is because they feel God will forgive them if they break these rules if they can recite them to Him on Judgement Day? Geeze. I know if you go before a judge and claim ignorance, they still put you in jail. If you go and claim you know full well what the laws are and deliberately broke them!

Well, imagine a big book flying straight at you!

Ignorance is bliss in this case.

To return to main page click here

DR. DOOLITTLE

2005-06-26T13:18:00.000-04:00

Note the dog's ears are back. It is scared of the strange man. It wants to get away.

Some of us can talk to animals. Everyone imagines they can talk to their pets but some of us can talk to any creatures, or rather, get inside of them, so to speak. Like any skill, it is both inborn and developed over time. One fad right now is "horse whispering" which is how people talk to scared horses by being gentle. This goes under "duh" for me. I have had violent horses. Whispering to a cocky stallion determined to crush your rib cage or feet would be hilarious to watch. Mostly, I speak loudly in cases like that, or rather, I yell very loudly.

Here it comes, yet again. A man who supposedly reads animals: From the Hampton Roads news:

Bill Northern kept picturing a dark-colored chair, maybe a sofa. Ezzie the dog insisted it was hers, and hers alone.

Northern held a small brass pendulum at the end of a short string in his right hand. As the pendulum swung back and forth, he closed his eyes and held his left hand palm up.

Northern, 67, is a self-proclaimed “animal communicator and equine consultant.” He listened to dogs and horses at the East Coast Equestrian Training Center in southern Virginia Beach on Thursday and Friday.

Hypnotizing dogs and horses isn't really all that new, actually. The Victorians were fond of hypnotism and ever eager to control animals since they needed to control them all the time, there was a fad for hypnotizing animals. Want to hypnotize a bird? You can't unless two people do it! Their brains are divided in two and each eye takes in reality seperately. heh.

Part Dr. Do little and part Dr. Phil, Northern travels the country and the world, “talking” to animals and their owners about behavioral issues, health problems and relationships.

For $60, Northern will spend 20 minutes listening to your animal’s concerns and relaying them to you. He will answer questions you want to ask your four-legged friend.

Animals don't talk in English. When a human who is a stranger looks at them, they don't blurt out stuff about their owners. I assure you, just trust me, this is what all animals, without exception, think: "Is this stranger dangerous? Will he eat me? Can I bite him? I wonder if he will fall down/run/faint if I jump at him? Why is he staring at me? I hate animals that stare at me. Maybe I should attack him."

Animals hate staring. Want to earn their emnity forever, stare at them. Predators and animals challenging their territory stare at them. I win the love of animals by not looking at them. Sometimes, I sit with my back to a shy animal and pretend something else is much more engrossing.

Once, I had to help a traumatized kangaroo. She huddled in her cage, shivering with fear, she was visibly depressed. I opend the door and took her leash to her harness and then laid it on my lap and proceeded to pretend to eat leaves. I examined each leaf and then chewed it. A nose inched over my shoulder. I casually slipped a leaf to the kangaroo. She ate it and then she nuzzled me. Within an hour, we were playing. She bounded happily about, free from her leash and each time I wanted her to return, I would bounce up and down and squeak. She would fly to my arms.

I have tamed parrots this way.

I have tamed bobcats and gila monsters and snakes. People have told me their snake/parrot/dog/cat or whatever hated strangers. Then I would befriend them and in no time have these hostile animals happily interacting. I ask nothing of them but to be themselves.

He says he was at a friend’s stable when he overheard a horse say, “I didn’t get an apple today.” Northern said, “What?” The horse said it again, and Northern asked the owner whether it was true. At first, the owner dismissed it, then remembered the daily apple had, indeed, been forgotten.

I don't know how this man reads the mind of the owners of animals but trust me, if a horse saw a stranger, he would send out this message, "Get me the bag of apples in the office, bring them here and give it to me, now." Why waste time dealing with the past? No horse does that. They are very goal oriented. I know my horse, Sparky, would do that. He would also tell you to open the door to the feed house and let him inside, too. And to fetch me and make me take down the gates and...you get the picture. Sparky loves mind control and he exerts his entire being to hypnotize humans into obeying him, not the other way around.

When you ride him, you signal with the reins, turn right. He will peer over his shoulder and sneer. And turn left. I used to let him go into trees to try to get rid of me only then I loop his reins in the branches, dismount and go tell him he is trapped.

He stopped doing it.

Full of tricks, that horse. Once, when he was pulling logs, he decided to stop and in a display of horse rage, he went through the entire reportoire of the Vienna Riding School Aires. Exausted by this effort, we patted him and told him, "Git up, boy," and made him finish pulling the trees. He was in a bad mood afterwards until I showed up with the sweetmix. Suddenly, all was forgotten...maybe. Hope he can't tell strangers about these things. Sheesh.

A day earlier, Parker asked Northern to talk to her horse, Jordan. The horse had a sense of humor, Parker said, “She was sure to tell Bill all of my bad habits.”

Jordan said Parker leans too far forward when she rides, “and she doesn’t like carrying my weight on her shoulders.”

In riding lessons, Parker said, she is frequently told not to lean forward – something that she said Northern wouldn’t have known before their session.

Earth to Jordan: if a horse is going to bellyache about riders, you can bet this is would they would want you to say, "Get the f.... off my back, you freeloader. I want to graze or chew the boards in my stall."

Sparky would probably add "c*cks*cker", being a stallion.

All the time, people come along who think they are reading animal minds. Usually, they are reading human minds.

By the way, many observers of wild animals like Jane Goodall, truly can communicate and understand those they watch. It is heartrending for Jane to meet enslaved chimpanzees. When she tells the humans what our nearest relatives are trying to say, it doesn't do much good. We still murder and enslave them and use them for medical/psychological experiments.

Take a guess where I stand on this issue.

Talk to any animal. Be a vegetarian.

FLAG WORSHIP

2005-06-23T08:24:00.000-04:00

In the news this week right on the heels of attacks on anyone saying our gulags are bad things is the Republican push to destroy yet another part of the constitution: the Holy American Flag amendment.

From the Washington Post:

A constitutional amendment that would allow Congress to ban flag burning passed the House yesterday, and congressional leaders said it has a strong chance to clear the Senate for the first time, sending it to the states for ratification.

The House has passed the measure four times before, but it has always fallen short of the two-thirds vote needed in the Senate. But changes in the Senate's makeup shifted several votes to the bill's supporters, and a lobbyist who leads the opposition said the absence of one or two senators could mean that the measure would pass.

"There are too many scenarios where we lose," said Terri Ann Schroeder, senior lobbyist for the American Civil Liberties Union. "We're very concerned." Schroeder counts 65 solid votes in favor of the amendment of the 67 needed for passage if everyone votes. "We still have a number of folks that have never voted, and we still have a potential problem if 100 members do not vote," she said.

The issue has been a favorite of conservatives since a 5 to 4 Supreme Court ruling in 1989 that protected flag desecration as free speech.

We all know that America trembles on collapse due to all that flag burning going on. Evidently, it is the root cause of global warming, all those people setting fire to Old Glory. What is really sad is many supporters of this foolish stuff hate the American flag and worship the Confederate flag. So why are they so anxious about the flag they themselves really don't like all that much?

Simple. It is an excuse to open the door to one more element of fascism: to elevate emblems of rule over religious icons. Usurping this often means uniting the two which is why so many Christian nations have crosses in their flags. This wasn't accidental. The Nazis were notorious flag wavers. From Garth Jones' 1933 article about one of Hitler's rallies:

From within we hear roar upon roar of applause and the thumping and the blare of a military band and the thud of marching, feet. The door leading to the platform opens and two of us step on to the platform. I have never seen such a mass of people; such a display of flags, up to the top of the high roof; such deafening roars. It is primitive, mass worship.

Yes, wall to wall flags with screams of "USA" over and over, the parading of our flags at the Olympics, etc. All are clear echoes of the Nazi way of doing things. People didn't worship flags before then, not to this extent.

It all goes hand in glove with primitive speech styles. As Mr. Jones notes in his article:

It the emotion of the National Eisteddfod exaggerated multifold. Imagine the Welsh national feeling responding to Mr. Lloyd George and add to bitterness of defeat, the depth of humiliation which, Germany has gone through; the painful poverty of the middle class, the sufferings through inflation, the rankling injustice of the War Guilt Clause and savage political hatred, and a picture of the Hitler crowd is there.

Imagine a speech of Mr. Lloyd George. Take away the wit, take away the intellectual play, the gift of colour, the literary and Biblical allusions of the Welsh statesman. Add a louder voice, less varied in tone, a more unbroken stretch of emotional appeal, more demagogy, and you have Hitler. Hitler has less light and shade than Mr. Lloyd George. He has less variety of gesture. Hitler’s main motion is to point out his right hand, which trembles. He is without the smile and the sharp glance of Mr. Lloyd George without his hush and sudden drop of the voice.

Mr. Lloyd George is more of an artist and knows that life is not all emotion or All tragedy. He lightens a grave speech with humour, as Shakespeare brings in the comedy of life in the porters’ scene in “Macbeth”. Hitler is pure tragedy or heightened melodrama, and reminds one of Schiller’s “Robbers”. His only comic relief is bitter irony. Mr. Lloyd George has a wider scale and as in a Beethoven symphony, makes lighter mood follow or precede a tragic part. Hitler is the Wagner of oratory, a master in repeating the leitmotiv in many varied forms, and the leitmotiv is “The Republican régime in Germany has betrayed you. Our day of retribution has come.” His use of the brass instruments of oratory is Wagnerian, and he thunders out his resounding blows against Bolshevism and against democracy.

Bush's strength is his abiility to be a mindless puppet, repeating robotically, all that is whispered in his ear. The weakness of Bush is from the same source: he is, unlike Hitler, a puppet. And now that his strings are broken, a weak puppet. When blood had to be shed, Bush's rhetorical shallowness betrayed him. Virtually no one, not even his most devoted worshippers, are heeding his call to arms simply because Bush, unlike Hitler, is a full time coward. And this shows. His lacksidasical speeches deflate enrollment in the military. Every time he opens his mouth to talk about death, his goofy grin and silly flailing of the arms, his frat in-your-face la-de-dah attitude drives down enrollment. The fact that anyone is still signing up is amazing.

The GOP is following their fascist game plan nonetheless. One is to wave the flag artifact while screaming about how much God loves Us and how great we are. The flaw in the leader is reflected in the collapse of volunteers to die for the magical flag. Many American kids don't give two hoots about the flag. Indeed, after a surge of patriotism after 9/11, flag worship is collapsing, not growing. There aren't armies of screaming youth running around, demanding we fly flags and bow to the Leader. Indeed, it is growing awfully quiet out there. I don't even see "Support the Troops" magnets all over everything, either, anymore.

Flag waving without volunteering to die for it becomes a joke, a comedy. Bush, unlike Hitler, neither believes in the flag nor honors it nor even gives two hoots about it. None of the GOP leaders fought to save the flag during the Vietnam war. They have been reduced to waving McCain's tattered flag whenever we attack them for being slackers who hate America. This is why the broohaha over Jesus' General (an my) joke posters asking GOP kids to sign up and fight is most revealing.

Here is one hysterical right wing kid's site:

So what? I know, I know. These people are just pissed off that President Bush won reelection. There were mad that he was elected in the first place and now having nothing new and no educated position to attack from, they just simply make an attempt to create a controversy. But these people are not new. When was the last time I received a comment on this blog challenging President Bush's proposal for reforming Social Security? Never. How come these hippies refuse to send me a statement about why they support the Democrat proposal for reforming Social Security. (Most likely because the Democrats still don't have a plan!) The same goes for every other major issue of national policy. All they have is no-Bush. And they lost that vote...TWICE ALREADY. And they aren't stopping....just wait until 2006 when there will be another round of Republican victories. These hippies will stop smoking pot for about 30 seconds, scratch themselves, and wonder why they keep loosing elections year after year.

Leftist hippies are the real threat to America - these "domestic terrorists" wish to destroy our country. They hope to remove everything we stand for. They strive the adoption of French as our national language and the forced conversion of the country to Islam.

These internet terrorists want the people who hate our country to win. And these vermin (as stated at the top of this post) want to do this at the expense of our lives and particularly the military - those who are putting their lives on the line every single day to defend America. These people are the same useless vermin that drive their hippy cars with bumper stickers saying "Support our Troops - Bring Them Home". But these actions of the left undermine our soldier's abilities to preserve our way of life - and aren't at all helping to protect us from the next terrorist attack.

Obviously these hippies would rather support a draft dodger (both Bill Clinton and Howard Dean) than members of the current Bush administration who have extensive military careers.

They are calling us "hypocrites" for the supposed support of a war...but refusing to join the military. Does this even make sense? Since when do I have to support my political stances with physical action. I believe in tougher testing standards for children in schools, but you don't seem me going to become a test writer for the Education Testing Service. Following this round of logic....if these people thing abortion is so great, how come they don't all sign up to be abortion doctors? Because it doesn't make sense!

I am including a good part of this little boy's rant because he reveals exactly why our fascists today are fake. They are pretend fascists. They voted for and follow a rank coward, both Bush and Cheney as well as 99% of the GOP leadership are cowards and this shows, boy, does it show.

They will pass laws "protecting" our flag but won't shed one drop of sweat to really protect it. They take the lazy man's way out. Mouthing pieties while piddling around. This is "cut the grass for the wife and then go get a blow job from a drug addict" lifestyle the GOP seems addicted to.

The entire Republican leadership is bellowing about how doubters and slackers are undermining our war against "terror" yet when we doubters and slackers turn to them and request they fight if they are so terrified of terror and suddenly the right goes slack jawed.

The childish scheme to rule the world is falling apart due to excessive cowardice in the wanna be Nazis running our country. The Civil War/Medieval war reenactors cheerfully go off to "die" every weekend. Many of our real life soldiers enjoyed this activity in days of peace and plenty under Clinton, a man they despised. But the ones who really fight wars are now being worn out and the fake warriors, the ones who cheerfully fight fake wars on weekends, are getting cold feet, too. So now we troll overseas for warriors.

This reminds me of something else: the Civil War reneacters are nearly uniformly in love with the Confederacy and slavery. They have to force members to be "Union" soldiers! They cheer like crazy when they see their favorite flag...the Stars and Bars of Confederacy!

So why are so many right wingers voting to change our Constitution? Huh? Congress has many younger members. They can go to Iraq and fight for America...yup.

POPE BANS PEDOPHILES.... But only for five years...

2005-06-17T17:37:00.000-04:00

"I am finally a film star! Emperor of the Universe!"

Oh joy oh joy. The boys in the long frilly dresses in the Boyz Klub in Rome decided after paying out a billion dollar to spring their fellow priests...they have made the unprecedented decision to not let the pedophiles back in for five more years so I suppose it is still safe to let your altar boy be near an altar.

The nation's Roman Catholic bishops agreed Friday to a five-year extension on their unprecedented policy of permanently barring sexually abusive clergy from church work.

The overwhelming vote by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops means the American church will stick with the main points of the policy it adopted in 2002 at the height of crisis brought on by molesters in the priesthood. The Vatican is expected to approve the extension.

The bishops' committee overseeing a review mandated by the original policy spent months soliciting comment from fellow church leaders. The panel concluded that "many, perhaps a majority," of bishops hope to someday ease the permanent ban on offenders. Some prelates believe it violates Catholic teaching on redemption Â that any sinner can be healed Â and treats every case equally no matter the severity of the offense.

However, the bishops' committee said that church leaders agreed now was not the time to soften the policy.

Chicago Cardinal Francis George, a leader in reviewing the plan with Vatican officials, said he was aware it created tensions between bishops and priests. He went as far as calling the permanent ban on offenders "draconian."

Now I get to blow my stack. Forgiveness? This from the creators of the Spanish Inquisition? The religion that handed St. Pete's keys to a former Nazi who ran the present Inquisition? The Church that didn't forgivGalileoeo until just fifteen years ago? The Church that ran the Albenginian Crusade which ended with them exterminating whole cities, burning the survivors at the stake????

What? This church that pretty much operated a two thousand year reign of terror against all other religions is forgiving?

Worse: they think I am not only a witch but that I will burn in hell forever because I won't go to their church and agree with everything they spout! Seriously. People willing to make me suffer eternal torment shouldn't yap about how they should forgive each other for poking themselves inside helpless little boys!

Sorry, guys, no.

Worse, this church icampaigningng to deny civil rights to real gay men and women who live together just like the Pope and his merry gang of (fill in the blank). These men want us to worship them while they molest and destroy and curse and hunt down gay men and women!

No. No way. Period. This is way wrong.

Well, the Boyz in the Hood in Rome don't care abouhypocrisycy. They know Jesus loves religious hypocrites! It is right there in the Bible! "And lo, Jesus said unto the smug priests, 'The hypocrite has the keys to Heaven for they don't keep their sh*t hidden under a basket but spread it about underfoot.'"

SHRINE VISITS INCITE MANY

2005-06-15T21:30:00.000-04:00

Japan continues to swerve to the right. Koizumi's most recent visit to the war criminal shrine provokes even more demonstrations. This time, the Koreans.

Police restrictions and a tense standoff with demonstrators forced a group from Taiwan to abandon a plan Tuesday to "liberate" the souls of loved ones from Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo.

The group of about 60 Taiwanese indigenous people opposed the fact that relatives and acquaintances who died in World War II while serving in the Imperial Japanese Army are "enshrined at a shrine dedicated to praise those who sent them to battlefields."

The Taiwanese had planned to wear ethnic costumes and hold a ritual called "Return, our ancestors' souls" to release the souls of their loved ones from the shrine.

But when they came near Yasukuni Shrine, their two buses were surrounded by hundreds of people believed to be members of rightist groups who shouted angrily at the Taiwanese group, as well as police and journalists who also crowded the scene.

Just like in America, if left wingers demonstrate, they get attacked by either mobs or the police or both but if even the KKK demonstrates, the cops protect them carefully from any enraged mobs and all right wing groups get to appear in nearly any venue they desire including all Presidential events while leftist groups have to be very careful of even the slightest problem or we get "police riots" since they are looking for any excuse to attack us. It is the same in Japan.

From Japundit (a right wing pro-Japanese site) a Chinese poster told this story about right wing abuse in Japan:

I posted this over at MarmotÂÂs site but in case this site draws a different audience.

For people that have studied Japan that post on this site, IÂd appreciate an explanation of the black van phenomenon in Japan. From the perspective of this American who has not extensively studied Japan, I can only see the failure of the authorities to crack down on extortion and intimidation tactics practiced by Japanese right wings groups as a tacit approval of their viewpoints and methods. I find that disturbing. It also leads me to think that public apologies from Japanese leaders over Nanjing, comfort women, etc. reflect only ÂtatemaeÂ and not ÂhonneÂ and from an American perspective that makes the apologies rather hollow.

Anyway interesting reading about right-wing groups in Japan and their influence.
http://www.japanesestudies.org.uk/discussionpapers/McNeill.html
You should read the whole thing. A side of Japan most gaijin never see or experience. A snippet:
My wife Keiko and I host a weekly talk show on local radio in Western Tokyo Â just before Christmas 2000 we talked briefly about a trip we had made a year earlier to Nanjing[i] in China Â walking through the museum in Nanjing that commemorates the incident, reading the testimony of hundreds of Chinese and non-Chinese survivors, looking at countless photographs of corpses and indeed their bones, some of which lie beneath the museum site, itÂs impossible to deny what happened. And we said so, adding that those who do should pay a visit there themselves.
Thirty minutes after the show was broadcast, three members of a local Âpolitical groupÂ arrived at the studio and asked to see the management. The station director, Sato-san, said he spoke for the station and, after exchanging name cards, everyone sat down.[ii] The only member of the group who spoke was the sempai (senior member) who softly and politely explained his displeasure. The Nanjing Massacre had not been Âofficially announcedÂ (koshiki happyo) by the government, so we shouldnÂt have mentioned it, he said Â Why, he wanted to know, were we going on about China? Was our radio station communist? Sato-san carefully noted these points, including the last, on a writing pad before escorting the visitors to the elevator, bowing and thanking them for their visit.
Two days later the senior station manager called a meeting. He apologized for taking our time and explained that from now on he would be very grateful if we would not discuss political issues on the radio Â He said we would need to apologize over the air for the Nanjing comment. If we didnÂt, the men and their friends would drive their gaisensha, or black sound trucks, outside our sponsors (two ramen, or Chinese noodle, restaurants, a bar, and a couple of real estate agents) and harass them until they withdrew their support. Violence was unlikely, but he couldnÂt rule it out. He apologized again for asking us to apologize. He handed us a sheet of paper the station had prepared for us to read on the next show. It said that we humbly apologized for the Âinappropriate commentsÂ (futekisetsu na hyogen ) we had made the previous week.
My wife and I were stunned. Far from being angry at a crude, thuggish attempt to shut down a public discussion, the stationÂs management had gone along with the rightistÂs suggestions and upped the ante, out-censoring the censors by requesting an end to all political discussion.

Comment by ariwrong Â 4/13/2005 @ 5:32 pm

Just as neo Nazi action in Germany should distress and alarm anyone, so should nationalist neo fascism in Japan cause both anger and demands for a government crackdown. The mealy-mouthed "apologies" of Kozumi coupled with his outrageous actions and his tacit support of the obviously illegal strongarming of the populace in Japan by the far right wing means Asia should take the strengthening Japanese/American fascist alliance very seriously.

In a recent Japanese poll 57.7 of the respondents said Koizumi shouldn't visit the shrine. Evidently, this popular support for ending the crisis isn't being heeded. Why?

NIKKEI: 11,415.88

Do you think it is a good move by Toyota to hike prices of its vehicles in the U.S. to help its struggling American competitors?
Yes
No

Look at these two side boxes in the Japanese newsite. The NIKKEI has been struggling to keep above 10,000 ever since the real estate bubble burst wdisastrousht after the disasterous Kobe earthquake. Yet their export market has boomed since then as well as their government money available which has been pretty much propping up the US government via "loans" yet the Japanese are a tad nervous, wondering when thbasiliskers will turn a basklisk eye towards Japan. The rage and fury over China's deficits has distracted American political parties from examining the dangerous relationship of the Japanese ruling corporate/right wing and the corruption and malefeasance and irresponsibilities of the American/corporate/right wing.

For business reasons, both entities have decided to cut out and attack both Korea and China because they are alarmed at the incursions being made by both countrie's capitalists. Just like, after visiting the newly installed right wing President, Bush, in 2001, neo fascist Sharon of Israel immediately and deliberately provoked the Muslims in Jerusalem to riot when he and a huge entourage entered one of Mohammedism's most sacred shrines, thus starting the Infantata and giving the Jews a green light to attack a mostly disarmed and surrounded population so they could build a wall and ghettoize Palestine.

Education minister Nariaki Nakayama apologized Tuesday for "causing trouble" to the government with his recent remark praising the removal of references to "comfort women" from revised history textbooks, top government spokesman Hiroyuki Hosoda said.

Nakayama apologized in a meeting of Cabinet ministers after being chided by Hosoda for his weekend remark that has drawn fire from South Korea and China, Hosoda told a press conference. (Kyodo News)

This was incredible. Once again, a top minister in Japan tried to belittle or minimize Japanese war crimes. Even as the courts dismissed lawsuits from the victims of these crimes, top ministers have the gall to mock them!

Japan and China on Tuesday agreed to hold subcabinet-level talks in Tokyo later this month to discuss various pending issues, a senior Japanese Foreign Ministry official said.

Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Shotaro Yachi and visiting Chinese diplomat Cui Tiankai who heads the Chinese Foreign Ministry's Asian Affairs Department reached the agreement during a meeting in Tokyo, the official said. (Kyodo News)

Once again, the Chinese attempt to get the Japanese to open serious negotiations. Since the Japanese slap in the face of the visiting Vice President last month, forcing her to cancel her visit, negotiations have only struggled along at lower levels.

The Chinese have used this time to strengthen alliances and form secret agreements with the many people who are interested in clipping Japan's wings.

It looks like some of the saner Japanese are trying to stop this mess:

The Osaka High Court on Friday is scheduled to hold a hearing of an appeal of a lawsuit filed by Taiwanese people who claim that Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visits to Yasukuni Shrine violates the Constitution.

RICH WOMEN WRITE DAINTILY

2005-06-12T11:21:00.000-04:00

Alex Hamilton's granddaughter

I am a ruling class black sheep. I write way too much and way too often and much too loudly. I talk about money, the top verboten topic of the ruling class. Shhhhh.

I was once at a meeting of some rather rich women who were considering if I should be part of their country club in New Jersey. The topic of women's rights came up. It soon devolved into complaining about the lack of servants and how much they cost and how to avoid paying SS taxes. The mayor's wife waxed lyrical about her maid. "I take good care of her, I treat her like my own daughter."

I said, "Oh, that is why, if it is raining, she has to walk the dogs instead of you?"

Needless to say, I was kicked out.

Well, the New York Times did a piece about these sorts of ladies.

STANDING in the living room of an apartment on East 60th Street in Manhattan, Elbrun Kimmelman rang a little silver bell that was said to have once belonged to Alexander Hamilton's granddaughter and called to order a meeting of the Causeries du Lundi.
snip
Nearly continuously for 125 years, this extremely private and exclusive group has gathered at a member's home almost always on the first Monday of every month during the New York social season, from November to May, to read aloud essays that members have written on topics that interest them.
snip
Some Causeries members are also eager to dispel the idea that the club is no more than a collection of wealthy dilettantes. "The club's not about airs at all," said Susan Nagel, a member. "We don't want to be portrayed as Junior League. It's about writing something wonderful and making it catch fire."

etc. These rich ladies in the Victorian era, in between snubbing immigrants and holding their noses when passing through the Lower East Side on charity tours, would "daintily" read their writings to each other, some of them even in a loudish voice while blushing...meanwhile, because my grandmother's father committed suicide in the 1892 stockmarket crash, she had to fend for herself. This made her loud and pushy and she was one of the first women to get a degree from a previously all male University, the University of Chicago, no less.

She ended up stomping around the place without a single servant.

Back to our sweet damsels in NYC today:

Travel continues to be a popular subject. Mrs. Kimmelman, who describes her husband, Peter, as a wealth manager, recently delivered a paper on her two trips to the wilds of Irian Jaya area of New Guinea, accompanied by her two children, two guides, a cook and at least five porters.

It was an area where there were cannibals. "I never felt afraid of being eaten," Mrs. Kimmelman said, "because traditionally head-hunting is a planned activity that takes place under very special and known conditions, such as a ritualized war or ambush in declared nonsafe zones."

Seems cannibals ate one of the Rockefeller kids! Anyway, with two guides and a cook and five porters to eat first, cannibals would probably spare this lady because if she is fashionable and rich you can bet she is all bones and no flesh. Any cannibal community forced to eat very rich women would die of starvation.

As for the ritualized warfare: geeze, um, she better examine her plate more closely when she dines with the cannibals in Washington, DC.

But then, Solyent Green is...human.

The young Miss Maupin went to Holton-Arms, a preparatory school in Washington that Jacqueline Bouvier had attended a few years earlier. Her parents allowed her to enroll at Sweet Briar College in Virginia, then a place mostly for well-born Southern belles. Breaking with tradition, she won a Fulbright scholarship to study abroad. "No one at Sweet Briar had ever got one," she read.

The Fulbright changed her life. It took her to Australia, where she met her future husband, a Chinese scholar from a distinguished Swedish family. "He was my favorite combination, a person both very sociable and very bookish," Mrs. Bielenstein read. "It was an angel's match."

Oh my. Pass me the smelling salts! She bravely went out into "the world" and after all the hazards met up and mated with...a member of the European branch of the ruling elite! Wow. Talk about coincidences! And they met in Australia.

This is how they operate. Like the famous story, "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" any two ruling elite can find each other in the remotest corners of the earth sans any global positioning equipment just by using their inherited inner radar.

These people float above it all. Periodically, some get sucked under when the economic waves get too rocky. Bad things can happen to them but it is easy to float back to the surface again. So long as the essential information is transmitted to the survivors: the stiff upper lip (I used to make fun of my mother's and I can do a knock down imitation of the Queen of England, myself), the noblise oblige passing of alms to the poor even when poor oneself and the cocking of the head backwards and looking down at the same time.

Oh, and the weight. You can never be too rich or too skinny. Back in the Victorian era, even, the upper crust ruling ladies kept a strict diet because this was their moral sop to make up for the other things they did. Eating daintily and carefully was drummed into little girls who also had to sit up straight (um, I sit bolt upright, my Victorian godmother insured that!), hands in lap, not staring at anyone.

Except to be mean, of course. That is fun.

Of course, talking about politics and sex and messing around with messy topics like the most dreaded of all, death, is verboten which is probably why I do all of that. I remember growing up and being punished if I said, "dead." No one died. People passed away. To this day, I can't say to someone in their face, "He is dead, Jim." Heh.

This ruling class should be carefully watched. They are shy and hide from the vulgar eye unlike entertainers or sports figures. They float into positions of power but not so forcefully that you would notice them. Some are taking a stab at public appearance by they are all appalled at how the wife of Schwarzenegger has been dragged down by her too public husband. They will be nice to her but they also would avoid bringing her to their estates. Someone might notice how they live!

This solicitude of their solitude is deliberate. It is an invisible gated community. They can stand right next to you and still be isolated. These people are the ones who sit upon the rest of humanity on the Friedman Flat Earth. Poor Friedman is Jewish so he is...not one of them. But he is a fine servant. Will be patted on his head and fed carefully.

The rewards for service are great but so are the dangers for if there is political unrest, these ladies will decamp for safer shores and quietly shove their servants into the mob to distract it so they can make their get away.

POPE'S RIGHT WING POOPS

2005-06-07T03:58:00.000-04:00

As the Gov. of Texas rides off to a church to sign a bill that restricts abortion rights and ladles out more funding and power to fundie churches, the new right wing former Nazi Pope shows us he is still the "Kinder, Kuchen, Kirche" good German fascist he was back when he was a Nazi.

Pope Benedict, in his first clear pronouncement on gay marriages since his election, on Monday condemned same-sex unions as fake and expressions of "anarchic freedom" that threatened the future of the family. The Pope, who was elected in April, also condemned divorce, artificial birth control, trial marriages and free-style unions, saying all of these practices were dangerous for the family.

I would suggest a man who never marries, hangs out only with other guys, all of whom wear floor length dresses and none of whom have even the faintest possibility of becoming pregnant even with a miracle working God trying to seduce them, these guys have no right to yap at us women concerning families and our bodies. Period.

Why do these creatures who form no families at all, raise no children, so interested in families? If they are such know-it-alls, they can show me how to do it themselves. You know, do housework, pay bills, work at a job, go to PTA meetings, worry about the teens going out at night, keep the spouse happy, etc. Then they can discuss my life choices with me.

I think they are anti family and should be shunned by "good Christians," no?

The Pope's words on Monday were no surprise. In an address to fellow cardinals before the start of the conclave that elected him in April, he denounced what he called an "anything goes" mentality that marked modern times.

I notice this former Nazi isn't using his influence and time to condemn torture and asking Catholics to not participate in torture.

And speaking of Catholics, the riots in Bolivia continue. Seems the people there are overthrowing their corporate government because they want social justice and all that. The Pope is mum. He probably is ticked off at his flock for getting the upper hand. He personally killed off "liberation priests" leaving Catholics to fend for themselves.

It seems to me that Catholics in many countries aren't searching for "pleasure," they are searching for power. With the selection of this far right wing former Hitler supporter the Church signals that liberation isn't the goal, suppression is the goal.

This Pope is interfering with political will all over the place in his attempt at controlling the lives and choices of millions of people who are either not Catholic or Christian or anything. This man wants to control us through laws so we can't live our lives while he lollygags about his fabulous palace, surrounded by men pretending to be eunachs, servicing his every wish, protecting child molestors who prey off of helpless children.

The Texan govenor who is toadying to the evangelicals there is equally despicable. The married folk in America will still be married even if other people get married, too. Why this should bother them bothers me. Are they that insecure? Looking at the average American, one wonders.

This self-hate, self centered style is degrading the body. We look physically worse and worse as we self indulge by eating and gambling and watching stupid entertainment on TV. This should worry moralists more!

The seven deadly sins don't mention gay marriage.

FIRST SUMMER STORM First summer rainbow

2005-05-27T20:51:00.000-04:00

Have a good Memorial Day Weekend and don't forget why we have this holiday. Anyway, Mother Nature sent us a gift this afternoon: our first thunderstorm this year.

Just like in real life, it gets very dark and lightning flashes, the thunder rolls.

But it is late afternoon and under the skirts of the storm, the sun peeks through and shines on the trees on the low mountains.

And a rainbow appears, even as the lightning still flashes further away, the rainbow grows brighter and soon arcs across the sky and the birds begin to sing again and the trees glow, each leaf alight. This is Nature. Fearful yet beautiful. Life springing anew.

HEADS IN BOXESTHE BUSHES AND SKULLS

2005-05-23T06:36:00.000-04:00

Years ago I learned all about the Bush family and their bizarre interaction with the Skull and Bones fraternity/cult at Yale. This strange "fraternity" is the breeding ground of not only America's ruling class but also the spook world. The activities of this cult/fraternity are swathed in darkness. When two members of this cult/conspiracy/fraternity ran against each other for President, both refused to divulge even the stupidest facts about this bizarre, powerful group.

Bush pretended they didn't exist and pretended to be surprised to hear it was still running strong at Yale---even after he invited them all to the WH to celebrate his Supreme Court victory! The press didn't note this.

Kerry refused to even answer a single question. He pretened there was no magical number of any combination of 322 or 332 or whatever.

Both men refused to talk about stolen skulls or what that might mean or discuss the illegality of grave robbing. Much less condemn this.

The Bush family is famous online now for this business. I am partially responsible for this because I am personally outraged by this whole matter for, you see, one of my ancestors was involved in setting up the Skull and Bones and beginning the grave robbing schemes. And trust me when I tell you this, he didn't do this as a "prank". He did it for religious reasons.

Namely, to do black magic.

Many people poo poo this stuff claiming it is all college pranks done by cute youth who don't know that it might be wrong to worship the Devil and kiss skulls and do various interesting rituals. Hahaha. Yup. These same folk yell all the time about how we have to love Jesus and follow the Pope and Hallelujia Protestant anti Darwinists. Bush himself makes a big to-do about his being a "Christian".

But this family has a thing about skulls. When the Apaches learned that Prescott Bush stole Geronimo's skull, they asked John McCain to intervene and get it back. Prescott Jr. gave McCain a skull which the University of Arizona examined and said it was a child's skull, not Geronimo's. So McCain took it back and it dissappeared in the maw of the Bush family skull collection. What? I wrote many letters complaining about this. Who was the child? Where did they get the skull? Shouldn't tests be run on it? Was the child murdered?

So much for America's CSI! No one seemed to be interested in this matter except for me, it seems.

The Apaches never got the skull but to quiet them, Bush visited and gave out Federal monies. Meanwhile, the cult in Yale claims there are no skulls there. Of course, this being America, not one cop showed up to search the crypt at Yale to see if they are lying. Naturally. And Yale's President didn't pull their charter and forbid their activities. What is a little grave robbing between frat brothers?

Kerry didn't say a peep about any of this. Trust me, I tried to get him to.

Sources say (to paraphrase the NYT and WP's favorite phrase) that Geronimo's skull resides at the Bush compound in Texas. We can't divulge how we know this, we just...know this.

To continue, proof that Bush likes to play with necromancing, namely using dead body parts for magic, comes up yet again with this astonishing news story that everyone poo pooed as "funny, hahaha". Russert, interveiwing Mr. Schroen of the CIA last week:

MR. SCHROEN: To some extent. Bin Laden is isolated, but I believe that he is able to still influence and communicate with his organization. It's true that terrorism has been globalized now in a way after 9/11 that's significant. But bin Laden remains a critical figure for us to focus on and to capture.

MR. RUSSERT: And direct the operation?

MR. SCHROEN: I don't know if he is actually directing it, but his spiritual guidance and his encouragement certainly adds emphasis to attacks around the world and groups around the world operating against us.

MR. RUSSERT: On September 1, 2001, you began a 90-day phaseout retiring from the CIA. Then came the horrific day of 8:46 AM, September 11, 2001. All our lives changed. You were asked to stay on at the CIA. On September 13th, you were summoned to the office of Cofer Black, the head of counterterrorism for the CIA. What did he tell you? What was your mission?

MR. SCHROEN: The mission was to--the first part of it was to go in and link up with the Northern Alliance, formerly headed by Ahmed Al-Massoud, and to win their confidence and their agreement to cooperate militarily with us. They were the only armed force on the ground in Afghanistan opposing the Taliban. The second part of it was, once the Taliban were broken, to attack the al-Qaeda organization, find bin Laden and his senior lieutenants and kill them.

MR. RUSSERT: Kill them?

MR. SCHROEN: Kill them.

MR. RUSSERT: Wasn't it illegal for us to kill foreign leaders?

MR. SCHROEN: I don't think at that point that the--I think the administration had gotten to the point where bin Laden and his guys were fair game.

MR. RUSSERT: As part of war?

MR. SCHROEN: As part of war.

MR. RUSSERT: Mr. Black gave you specific instructions on what he wanted you to bring home.

MR. SCHROEN: That's true. He did ask that once we got bin Laden and killed him, that we send his head back in a cardboard box on dry ice so that he could take it down and show the president.

MR. RUSSERT: Where would you find the dry ice in Afghanistan?

MR. SCHROEN: That's what I mentioned to him. I said, "Cofer, I think that I can come up with pikes to put the heads of the lieutenants on," which is the second part of what he wanted done. "Dry ice, we'll have to improvise."

MR. RUSSERT: Why couldn't you find bin Laden?

The mythology of the Skull and Bones is to worship the skulls of those who killed Americans, who had religioius magical powers and who were magicians of a sort, themselves. This way the Skull and Bones can "plug into" the powers of darkness that these historic people controlled. "Big Juju" so to speak. This is akin to the beliefs of Voodooism which was a big fad in upper class families back 200 years ago thanks to their children being raised by slaves.

This Voodoo stuff has transmutated but it is most astonishing that Bush can get away with pretending to be a Christian while openly persuing his favorite hobby of collecting the skulls of leaders of rebellions against American imperialism. The fact that he wanted bin Laden's head is very troubling. One should think Congress should have hearings about this. Forget Galloway's supposed cooperation with Saddam, what about Bush's cooperation with Satan?

*EVERYBODY EXPECTS THE SPANISH INQUISITION

2005-05-21T09:31:00.000-04:00

The billowing waves of propaganda that spewed out of the Pope's grave continues unabated as the press tries to make the Holy Inquisitor in Chief look good and pander to Catholics who still go to church, which is no longer the majority if one peeks inside actual churches.

The latest salvo is Bush pandering as usual.

President Bush praised Pope Benedict XVI and "the Catholic contribution to American freedom" yesterday at a Catholic prayer breakfast, an event emblematic of the rising clout of religious groups in the nation's capital.

Modeled on the Protestant-led congressional prayer breakfast that has been held each February for more than half a century, the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast is in its second year. It attracted 1,600 people, 14 members of Congress and the president to a packed hotel ballroom where waiters in black tie served scrambled eggs to activists who wore sweat shirts that read "You can't be Catholic and pro-abortion."

This is the Inquisitor-in-Chief's big thing this time around as he meddles freely in our private affairs. It never ceases to amaze me how people who laud freedom seem to be endlessly plotting to restrict my civil rights. As we fight for "freedom" and "democracy" overseas these same people remove them here at home. We want real elections! With real vote counting!

This freedom loving Church is busy kicking people out for not conforming to Ratzi the lover of Freedom if they don't hew to his line.

When former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani receives an honorary degree this morning from Loyola College in Maryland and speaks at the Catholic school's 153rd commencement in Baltimore, the city's archbishop and his representatives won't be there.

Never mind that Cardinal William H. Keeler does not ordinarily attend the college's annual spring exercises. And never mind that Keeler was not formally invited to this year's event. As the local guardian of Roman Catholic doctrine, the archbishop of Baltimore felt compelled this week to express his views on an occasion featuring a Republican politician known for supporting abortion rights.

"May I state," Keeler wrote to Loyola's interim president, David Haddad, in a letter dated Wednesday and posted yesterday on the archdiocese's Web site, "that there will be no representative of the Archdiocese participating in any event honoring former Mayor Giuliani. I am confident that, by now, you understand many of the consequences that spring from an invitation having been extended to former Mayor Giuliani to receive an honorary degree at Loyola. May the Lord make of this event a teaching moment for many."

Dear God! The teaching moment seems to be "no one expects the German Inquisition!" As the Church Inquisitor-in-Chief tries to use all his minions to enforce Church doctrine upon all Catholics trying to turn our free nation into a Taliban replica, all one can say is, "Seperation of Church and State". Obviously, no one in the various "faiths" can be real Americans since they are all, Jewish or Protestant or Catholic or whatever, are being told that their religion trumps their citizenship to America. Imposing their own religious bigotry upon our nation which is made up of many religions means they are swearing allegiance to the flag, they are beholden to something else. Maybe this is why they all seem so been on the "One nation under GOD" stuff. They aren't swearing to support America or the Constitution but rather their own cults.

Cults are very dangerous to states. The Catholic cult, for example, is now sworn to obey a former Nazi who is a right winger living in another country. He is not an American. The American cults like the Baptists who want people to only support the GOP are equally bad in that they divide America. The entire point of citizenship is to unite across class and ethnic lines, not divide and conquer.

On top of this rank attempt by Bush to cultivate antifeminists in the Churchalong comes his ditzy wife, Laura, telling Muslims to liberate their women!

One of the White House's more popular envoys to the outside world, the first lady started her solo diplomatic mission on Friday by talking frankly about America's serious image problems here, singling out abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

At the World Economic Forum on Saturday, Laura Bush stuck more closely to the administration's message of hope, citing elections in Afghanistan and Iraq, a newly elected president for Palestinians, and women being given voting rights in Kuwait.

"Women who have not yet won these rights are watching," the first lady told a conference room on the shore of the Dead Sea. "Freedom, especially freedom for women, is more than the absence of oppression," she said. "It's the right to speak and vote and worship freely. Human rights requires the rights of women."

Whoopee. Women in Kuwait get rights but women here in America don't? The Pope doesn't care about Kuwait but Laura's husband is willing to help him Kuchen, Kirche und Kinder us here in America?

And the CNN story does mention the glaring problem of super women suppressing nation, Saudi Arabia. Laura says nothiing about that place. Evidently, the kissing and hugging of Saudi rich men means they get a green light to oppress and humilate women. We noticed this before. When invading Afghanistan, American propaganda made a big thing about freeing the Afghani women who are, as far as we can see, not free at all. The Soviets freed them much more. Back then, under the communists, women could hold jobs that interacted with men, they went to school..with boys and men...they could wear western dress. Laura trotted off to that place to affirm women's rights. Yet she is utterly silent at home on this same, pressing issue.

Like a wind up Liberation Barbie doll she goes out, flaps her gums and then retreats back into her private boudoir where we presume she reads novels and dreams of stallion studs while her own daughters run drunk through the streets, flashing their underclothes.

PREGNANT STUDENT KICKED OUT OF GRADUATION

2005-05-19T09:07:00.000-04:00

We debated where to put this story, education news or religious news. The fact that Ratzi who claims he was a liberal until Elaine yelled at him about "Kinder, Kuchen, Kirche" back in Tuebingen in 1968, is encouraging retrograde meaness to school girls has this editor pretty riled up.

Word of warning: when I was in college, I had my first child out of wedlock. Yes. I not only went to school with a baby inside, I did this with a baby outside, while nursing. And back then, the university was pretty nasty about students having babies. So I made a big deal about this. We sued because they had subsidized student housing for married students sans children but not for mothers with families. We won this, years after leaving school.

This story is cruel:

A pregnant student who was banned from graduation at her Roman Catholic high school announced her own name and walked across the stage anyway at the close of the program.
Alysha Cosby's decision prompted cheers and applause Tuesday from many of her fellow seniors at St. Jude Educational Institute. But her mother and aunt were escorted out of the church by police after Cosby headed to her seat.

OK. Time to rant. The police, at the behest of the religious nut running this "ceremony", were told to arrest this charming and sweet young ladies mom and auntie? What the hell? This girl, smiling, heads back to her seat after daring to take her well earned diploma in an honorable way, cheered by fellow students, only to see her loved ones arrested for this?

I am speechless...NOT! I am outraged. The Pope better discipline this monster. "Suffer the children" indeed. The Bible itself has Joseph demanding of God why he shouldn't repudiate his bride who is pregnant out of wedlock and God told him via an angel to not make a big deal about this.

JESUS WAS A BASTARD. This should be in huge letters on every Church everywhere. He was a bastard child who was basically adopted by Joseph.

Cosby was told in March that she could no longer attend school because of safety concerns, and her name was not listed in the graduation program.
The father of Cosby's child, also a senior at the school, was allowed to participate in graduation.

Note how the father was punished. Given full honors. And pray tell, who was threatening this poor girl? From the story it seems her fellow students supported her quest for the holy diploma. Was the priest running this joint the one threatening her?

Mean. This is just too mean.

I hope this young lady goes to college. I fought hard for the rights of young mothers attending college honorably.

Churches Support Bush Thanks to Bribes

2005-05-17T12:53:00.000-04:00

Jesus whipping money out of the religious houses

Just like Bush hands out cash stipends and tax cuts to the media along with allowing them free range to create monopolies and cartels, so he bribes Churches to support him.

It isn't because this famous Skull and Bones "chant to the devil that is death" is so religious. He hasn't shown any religious impulses like say, Jimmy Carter, a real Christian, shows. He mouths platitudes but he keeps the faith by bringing home the bacon.

Both Sacred Zion and the Druid Heights corporation are engaged in the type of "social entrepreneurship" encouraged by Bush, who says both faith-based and secular groups play a vital role in the difficult task of bringing relief to the distressed and impoverished. But the president's budget proposals say something else when it comes to the nation's fight against poverty.

Bush has pushed for increased funding for religion-based groups while proposing deep cuts for many traditional anti-poverty programs. The result is that many small church- and community-based social service programs are slowly assuming the lead role in the war on poverty once held by long-established community development organizations. Administration officials say that faith-based groups are often less expensive and more effective in helping the needy, a contention that traditional service providers challenge.

The Churches have this overhead: churches, which have to be maintained. So they run AA meetings and such and collect tax payer money for this "service". As they seek more forms of sucking off the government teats they corrupt their mission to the point that it becomes a vacuuming operation to clear funds one way or another. It doesn't matter if the services are slender to none. Just go through the motions.

Even as the Bush people scream we have no money they increase the funds flowing into the Church coffers because by purchasing the services of the preachers they can keep unlawful power without too much effort. This is exactly why not one Church entity is screaming about abortions. They have control of everything now and can easily get it yet no one is moving at all on this topic. Even gay rights are extending, not contracting. There are many gays working for Bush and he has assured them that this money flowing to the Churches will buy their silence. In turn, the Churches are given the green light to attack the abortion/gay issue with all their holy frevor...until the day after the election when another billion will pour into the treasure chests.

Bush's 2006 budget proposed slashing public housing subsidies, food stamps, energy assistance, community development, social services and community services block grants -- programs that for decades have constituted the federal anti-poverty fight. While congressional budget makers have promised to restore some of the funding, they also have agreed to the president's tax cuts and overall spending targets, meaning there will be stiff competition for a shrinking pot of money.

At the same time, Bush's budget proposal for next year contemplates adding $385 million in new religion-based programs to this year's eventual total. The federal government awarded more than $2 billion in such grants in 2004 -- nearly double the amount awarded in 2003. Funding under the president's faith- and community-based initiative has gone up despite Congress's refusal to enact legislation that would allow faith-based groups to discriminate by religion when hiring staff, something Bush says should be allowed as long as they offer their services to people of all faiths and do not use federal money to proselytize.

They don't want to proselytize. That is hard work. They just want the money to flow. They don't care what it is for or that some result must come of it, just pass the collection plate and eat that fried chicken. No Church is going to heat a home. They will suck up the money and then make the poor jump through humiliating hoops to get a check. One church in New Hampshire this winter would send troops over to check out people's homes and if they had cable TV they got no heating help, for example.

This scheme to win the hearts and wallets of the religious so the rich can cut taxes and form monopolies and cartels is a cynical effort that is, in the bitter end, going to destroy the Churches by corrupting them.

Time for Jesus to go and turn over the money changer's tables.

Churches Batten Down the Hatches

2005-05-16T06:54:00.000-04:00

I seem to remember all sorts of Bible stories from my youth in a lily white Luthern Church. These Bible stories were about Jesus inviting all and sundry to follow him. Male, female, young and old. Little children even. People of any color, any ethnic background. All were welcome to his loving embrace...hold your horses!. Seems many a vicar and preacher for this Jesus are screaming at us to go away. Seems the latest fad in right wing America is to exclude people. Just like when the TV bosses refused to run an ad for a Church that wanted to invite gay people into their services even as gays get locked out, the bosses whined this was mean and they didn't want to run divisive commercials about embracing people and loving them.

Meanwhile, the NYT commissions a study of what is wrong with them and arrives at this amazing conclusion: they need to cover rural America and religion more. Pray tell us, didn't the NYT run nonestop stories about a Pope dying of old age? And covered his funeral like it was a Second Coming? And then did an hour by hour story about the Ratzi ~~coup~~election? And when it was revealed that this man had a squirrely Nazi past, they helped to laugh it all off? And worse, when he peeped out of his palace to wave, this made front page news? And we need more of this? So...

From the pulpit of East Waynesville Baptist Church, the temporary pastor offered an unusual message for his adopted flock: "I don't mind telling you before I start off this morning, this is not where I want to be."

No one blames him. Over the past two weeks, the modest brick church with baskets of artificial lilies on the doors has found itself at the center of a national debate, a crash test site in the mixing of politics and religion. The Rev. Chan Chandler, the young minister who led the congregation of about 100 people for the last three years, is gone, having resigned under fire last week and taken his mostly younger followers with him. And nine longtime church members who said he had ousted them because they did not support his increasingly political sermons are back.

When Mr. Chandler, 33, resigned on May 10, some said the battle had been won. But the congregation that regrouped on Sunday was smaller and grayer, teary-eyed and leaderless.

A preacher comes to town and conspires with some angry and obviously right wing deranged people to hijack a church and is foiled by the press and by church goers who refused to leave when he ordered them out and now they are sad because they can't attract angry white parisoners who want to use the church as a political base so they can plot things? Seriously, if they are that eager for people, maybe the church goers should go out into the community where there are other people, maybe blacker in color, and spread the good word of Jesus who never once founded or talked inside of a church.

The NYT is interested in rural America and obviously, their churches. We are glad they noticed this story which the bloggers have been watching closely since the first hours it made news down south.

Even Mr. Chandler's opponents acknowledged that he brought new life and new members to the 52-year-old church.

"He was energizing them," said David Wijewickrama, a lawyer for the ousted members. "But he was not energizing them with religion, he was energizing them with hate."

Isn't someone who is using the name of Jesus to energize people with hate....a possible anti Christ? One senses these poor church goers wanted the energy and Luciferian powers of this deranged orator. We assume they overlooked his unpleasant sides. I remember the son of our own Germanic minister who was a full blown Nazi. Everyone pretended to not see him. He was painfully obvious.

He even wore the Nazi uniform to meetings.

Here is how Ratzi the Nazi is running his Church:

A Roman Catholic priest denied communion to more than 100 people Sunday, saying they could not receive the sacrament because they wore rainbow-colored sashes to church to show support for gay Catholics.

Before offering communion, the Rev. Michael Sklucazek told the congregation at the Cathedral of St. Paul that anyone wearing a sash could come forward for a blessing but would not receive wine and bread.

A group called the Rainbow Sash Alliance has encouraged supporters to wear the multicolored fabric bands since 2001 on each Pentecost Sunday, the day Catholics believe the Holy Spirit came to give power to Christians soon after Jesus ascended to heaven. But Sunday's service was the first time they had been denied communion at the altar.

Archbishop Harry Flynn told the group earlier this month that they would not receive communion because the sashes had become a protest against church teaching.

Sister Gabriel Herbers said she wore a sash to show sympathy for the gay and lesbian community. Their sexual orientation "is a gift from God just as much as my gift of being a female is," she said.

Can't let those people "eat the body of Christ". Heavens. We all remember Jesus saying, "Keep those damn people away from me, hit them with whips". He didn't say, "Suffer the children to come to me," he said, "Make those little creeps suffer for coming to me". Yes, the Bible tells us so.

Perhaps we should make "Jesus Loves You" Tee shirts that list all the people Jesus can't love. It would have to be a full length burkha.

The Crusades

2005-05-14T19:58:00.000-04:00

After 9/11, Bush tried to reassure the Muslims that we were not going a crusading against them. He even went to the UN and announced the USA would support a Palestinian state. This promise turned to thorns nearly immediately when a brutal nearly one sided war broke out ending with the Jews in the Holy Land building a huge wall around segmented Palestinian ghettos. This matter isn't settled at all, it continues as the festering sore of the Islamic world and breeds profound hatred of all things European and American.

A new movie just came out about the Crusades which tries to show both sides sympathetically. Unfortunately, unlike the wildly popular semi-porn S&M spectacular, "The Passion of Christ", it isn't a big hit. We have yet to see the movie but hope to see it since my husband and I met when we were in full armor fighting in the fashion of Crusaders in the Middle Ages. It is a fond topic for us when we were in the Society For Creative Anachronism.

The pretense that America wasn't fighting Muslims or trying to destroy them and replace them has been dropped. When a top general who is now in charge of assassinations and spook stuff declared in a church that he was crusading for Jesus this speech caused consernation in many places. We fully expected him to be forced into retirement but he was not only advanced in postion but given a very grave position which made the news the last few days, all of it pretty negative.

Yesterday, Bush and the Pentagon, to further terrorize the Muslims who were rioting over our flushing the Koran down the toilet, issued a story that the USA used a Predator missile in Pakistan to kill a "top" al Qaeda member which in English means we blew up another village of peasants in the mountains there. This "wonderful victory" sent the dictator of Pakistan to the press with this:

Pakistan has denied US media reports that a senior al-Qaeda leader has been killed on Pakistani soil by an unmanned US Predator drone.
Several US television networks said the al-Qaeda member, Haitham al-Yemeni, was killed near the Afghan border by a missile fired from the aircraft.

Back to the BBC story about the crusades:

History matters. And cinema's portrayal of history matters too. Kingdom of Heaven may be a medieval epic set in 1187, just before a Crusader army was wiped out at the battle of Hattin. But it has already been criticised for being a very 21st century, politically correct, view of the Crusaders' world.

Professor Jonathan Riley Smith of Cambridge University is probably Britain's leading historian of the Crusades. This film has made him angry, for the Crusades are, at the moment, a rather hot subject.

Rewriting history?

"In the Islamic world," he told me, "crusading is believed by many Muslims to be still in train.

Courtesy of Antiwar.com via Tiny Revolution comes this interesting web site:

Force Ministries This is a violent Jesus web site that looks like it was designed by al Qaeda inspired Jihadists. Only it comes from the Belly of the American Military Beast. The pictures at this web site feature men in khaki shooting at the viewer. It is drenched in the words of violence and blood and war. Basically, it is exhorting people to kill Muslims for Jesus. A holy war, an ungodly mess.

Couple this with the ongoing riots concerning the flushing of the Koran down the toilet at our top secret prison in Cuba and one can see that this war against bin Laden and Saddam has spiralled down the toilet and is now becoming a very toxic mess indeed. It certainly alarms the editor of this blog to see this happening. Couple this with the news about born again Christians harrassing others at the Air Force Academy and that the Lutheran minister there was forced out of his job for complaining about it and the few Jewish students there had to file a civil rights lawsuit alleging religious discrimination and one can see this stew isn't healthy nor will it end peacably.

The death toll from the Crusades was horrific. Each surge across the Holy Land was drenched in blood. Jersusalem was put to the sword more than once. From the bloody demise of the Children's Crusade to the looting of Constantinople, it was one long, ugly, hideous convulsion.

And we are reproducing it with reckless disregard!

Time to Launch a Religion Page

2005-05-14T17:08:00.000-04:00

This blog multiplies like a mad rabbit. But things move too fast on individual pages and it is amusing to have seperate pages for seperate topics and nothing is more topical than religion. The riots over the flushing of the Koran, for example, belong here. Tracking the American Taliban Christians belongs here. So do stories about the Skull and Bones satanic fun.

Thank you,
Elaine Supkis,
Editor, Culture of Life News