Those Truth Vibrations are getting stronger folks…

There seem to be several interesting developments happening at the same time these days.

First off, Anti-Bilderberg 2013 was a runaway success. I’ve watched the footage and YouTube videos very closely, read the news reports and you can’t help but feel that something extremely encouraging has taken place. The Hertfordshire police thought no more than 300 people would show up. Instead thousands did. 2000 more had to be turned away at the gate.

The crowd waiting to get into the Bilderberg site.

Politicians took to the mike along with guerrilla journalists and speakers and researchers. People from across the UK and overseas showed up. Protesters were hugging cops and the cops hugged them right back (it helps that English cops don’t carry guns). In fact the protesters were so polite and peaceful, it’s easy to see why many of the cops there seemed to be having a good time and listened earnestly to the protesters. Some even walked away convinced that maybe these loony conspiracy theorists are actually on to something.

Note to all activists, protesters and concerned citizens: THIS is the way it’s done. The old saying is true: You’ll attract more bees with honey than with vinegar.

I hope all subsequent anti-Bilderberg meetings from now on become like this. It’s finally on the mainstream media’s radar screen and it looks like it’s going to stay there. The Fringe Festival is a brilliant idea. If it continues, this thing is going to snowball, I’m sure of it. The only thing I wished I saw was some yoga practitioners showing up in solidarity like they have in Taksim Square in Istanbul.

Would’ve been cool to see a bit of this at Bilderberg

Another thing, the gathering missed the ritual and ceremonial aspect completely. I would have done earth-based ceremony around the site days or weeks in advance and then during the days of the meeting, had the First Nations drummers out in full force, at the 4 cardinal directions around the hotel. These things send out vibes/thoughts/frequencies and would go a long way to influence the Bilderbergers, in a good way, from a distance.

Second: Is anyone really surprised by this National Security Agency (NSA) scandal in the US?
Ever since 9-11 and ever since the chimp-lookalike Bush’s administration with Homeland Security becoming even more draconian against Muslims, suspected terrorists, Occupy activists, in fact ANY kind of activist or anyone that questions governments, banksters or corporations. Of course it was just a question of time before they started listening in on phone calls, reading private emails and embroiling Google, FaceBook and MSN in their complicity. Julian Assange warned as much ages ago. Assange is also praising Snowden as a hero and is urging him to seek asylum in either Russia or South America. I don’t always agree with Glen Greenwald but this was truly a spectacular piece of reportage and investigative journalism. Kudos to him. The jury is still out on whistleblower Edward Snowden and from what I understand, he’s hiding out in Hong Kong so he can escape Private Bradley Manning‘s fate.

Some Icelandic politicians, in their truly unique tradition, are looking to offer political asylum to Snowden. There are calls for impeachment against Obama. The entire country is literally going apeshit over this.
My advice: Don’t use Google, use Startpage. Unlike Google, they don’t record IP addresses and it’s the one search page many software developers and hackers use. From what I heard, they will shortly be launching an email service as well.

Screw Google, go here instead.

Third: I can’t speak for everyone but at least in my corner of the world, many politicians are being outed big time for kickbacks, drug usage and plain old corruption.

Canada’s dictator, Step-Hen Harper has no warm, human blood in him. Instead, ice-cold liquid mercury runs in his veins.

Step-Hen Harper is embroiled in a scandal where his chief of staff paid off a conservative Senator Mike Duffy for $90 000 for “living expenses”.

Rolly-polly bigoted Toronto mayor Rob Ford may have some phone camera video of him smoking crack cocaine floating out there somewhere. The video has not surfaced but half his staff quit anyway and his credibility is in tatters. Maybe he can go on a fishing trip with his buddy Step-Hen and commiserate on their bad fortune together?

Local Montreal shyster Dr. Arthur Porter, who was the head of the McGill University Health Centre (MUHC), is fighting an extradition order to Canada where he faces serious corruption charges. Porter, a doctor from Senegal, somehow through Step-Hen Harper, was elected the the Queen’s Privy Council of Canada and was made a board member of CSIS, the Canadian Intelligence agency.

Old pals, Step-Hen and Arthur Porter

Porter seriously screwed up the MUHC and their plans to build a super-hospital. He awarded contracts to his cronies and because of the cronyism and corruption, the entire university has been crippled. They are cutting back on essential staff and services, fees are being raised while these assholes walk away with golden parachutes. Anyway Porter has been found guilty of corruption and the Quebec government want him back for questioning. What does he do? He now claims he has Stage IV cancer and “cannot travel” from his location in the Bahamas. Funny enough, he seemed well enough to travel to Panama where he and his wife were caught last week. Porter has said that if he goes down, he’s going to name names, including politicians, businessmen, socialites and typical movers and shakers. To say that Quebec is a corrupt place is the understatement of the century.   Just yesterday interim- Montreal mayor, Michael Applebaum was picked up on corruption charges, this after he said he was going to clean up house after his predecessor Gerald Tremblay was also forced to resign over corruption charges. My guess is that there’s a sweetheart deal in the works behind the scenes. He’ll probably name some names, but not the most important ones and he’ll get a penalty or next-to-nothing jail time.

Keep your nose clean, always pack an extra pair of underwear and sit back, relax and watch this comedy show. At this rate, who knows what will happen next given the climate these days….

Bilderberg 101

For those of you who are out of the conspiracy/Truther movement loop, the hyper-secretive Bilderberg group are meeting this weekend at the Grove Hotel in Watford, England. This group essentially consists of the wealthiest, most powerful and influential businessmen, politicians, presidents-in-waiting, royalty, policy makers, philanthropists and industrialists and all of it is done in secret. It’s not like Davos, Switzerland where they show up publicly and members of the public can join in the conversation. Bilderberg, like Bohemian Grove is strictly off-limits to the public. This is where these globalist assholes decide the agenda for basically the entire world.

Ring of steel going up around the hotel, to keep the riff-raff public out (photo from infowars.com)

A complete list of those expected to attend this weekend can be found here, but I what I found curious was that there is an unusually high number of Turkish attendees this year and given the happenings in Turkey these days, I doubt that is a coincidence. These things never are.

Also of note, take a very close look at that list. No one from Russia, China, Latin America, Arab countries, Africa or India. Not only is this very Euro-centric and Anglo-Saxon-based, to anyone with a few sparks in their head, the exclusion of certain countries and parts of the world should tell you something right away.

This year, things are a little different though. While in years past, the annual Bilderberg meeting was usually gate crashed by a handful of activists, this year, there will be a full on Bilderberg Fringe Festival (which I’m hoping will also become an annual event) taking place concurrently for the whole weekend. Luke Rudowski of “We Are Change” is there. David Icke and Alex Jones will be speaking and the hilarious Artist Taxi Driver has shown up as well. Now the mainstream media, after NEVER having reported this meeting and cooperating in the media black-out around Bilderberg, have finally thrown their hat in and this includes the grand ole’ BBC.

EU members of parliament and UK politicians have also started to question the secrecy of these meetings and I’m hoping like hell that thousands descend on Watford. Political analyst James Corbett of the Corbett Report recently did a vlog posting on Bilderberg and what he says, I think is spot on, that Bilderberg is just the literal tip of the iceberg. These people makes backroom deals all the time and they don’t need to be in each other’s physical presence to do it. That to just concentrate on this one meeting is a mistake, you need to keep your eye on the ball at all times. It’s not just Bilderberg or Bohemian Grove or Davos or G8 meetings or the Council on Foreign Relations or the Trilateral Commission or the Club of Rome or Freemasons or Opus Dei. It’s all of this and more. You need to be able to see the bigger picture and try to understand that these participants are basically foot soldiers for a bigger plan.

While Bilderberg is the working meeting for these dark suits, the Formula 1 races is where they party and let loose. While Bilderberg is happening in England, Montreal will be hosting the F1 (which means I disappear for a few days). It’s a festival for vulgarians, where the world’s jet set come to town to party really hard. People like Bernie Ecclestone, Flavio Briatore, Richard Branson, celebrities like the cast of X-men (which is filming in Montreal as we speak), lesser royals like Peter Phillips (who picked up his wife Autumn Kelly here a few years ago where she worked as a hostess), Arab sheikhs, very high end prostitutes and escorts will be filling the restaurants, hotels and streets of Montreal. Restaurants won’t let anyone in unless they reserve a table at $15000/table in advance. The streets become pedestrianized and open terraces are created. Clubs are lined up with girls trying to find an elderly sugar daddy and guys go check out the cars with the hostesses in micro-mini skirts or skimpy bikinis throwing beer everywhere.

The city is awash with scenes like this all weekend long…

…or this. F1 dwarf-boss Bernie Ecclestone and his statuesque, much younger (now ex-)wife

VIP parties, private parties at Cirque du Soleil billionaire founder Guy Laliberté‘s private compound in nearby St.Bruno take over the city. I know a girl who did modelling for a while who got invited to Laliberté’s party and basically the compound is locked down completely after midnight until dawn, no one can leave and she has seen full-on orgies take place there with many, many celebrities in attendance. Like something right out of Stanley Kubrick’s “Eyes Wide Shut”. You can understand why I never stick around with that kind of psychic energy polluting the city.

My own personal feeling is that these elitist types are shitting bricks these days. Too many people have woken up to them and the weight of public consciousness has shifted the scales. The genie is out of the lamp and it ain’t going back in. These sorts of gatherings have their days numbered. Just watch.

The Extinction of the Unique

An army of demonstrators facing off riot police in Istanbul.

I’ve been steadily watching the ongoing riots and demonstration happening in Turkey the last week, it hits a bit close to home since I spent several years living and working there and consider it in some ways my second home. The names of the squares, the neighborhoods the news reports mention are all dearly familiar to me.

Kizilay, the center of Ankara.

I left Turkey in 2002, just before Ergodan got in. In fact I actually had a run-in with him while he was on his election campaign. It was in the ancient city of Amasya. Me and a group of friends were there spending the weekend and staying at one of the old Ottoman houses which have since been converted into boutique pensions and hotels.

Amasya, sits along the banks of the river-valley of the Yeşilırmak River. Full of old, preserved Ottoman homes and tombs of ancient kings carved into the mountainside, it’s a wonderful place to spend time. The region is also famous for it’s apples.

We were there to do some serious hiking and investigate the ruins and tombs of Pontic kings which have essentially been carved into the mountainside. We saw Erdogan give a speech in the town center and an American in my group yelled out “Hey Eddy” while frantically waving. Erdogan waved back but then when he realized we were a bunch of foreigners, looked confused and then stopped waving.

The Migros mall in Ankara.

Anyway, I’ve returned to Turkey several times since then and the country becomes more unrecognizable each time I go. It saddens me immensely that the small things which made Turkey unique, like the Pasaji malls, the small old-fashioned cinemas and neighborhood weekly food bazaars (farmer’s markets) are disappearing quickly.

Weekly neighborhood farmer’s markets or “pazaars” usually rotate around the city so everyone has a chance to buy from local farmers.

Historical places which were off-the-beaten path like Olympos have been overtaken by mass-tourism, losing it’s charm and soul along the way. American-style subdivisions have swallowed up Ankara. You can easily mistake some of them for a suburb in New Jersey or California now. Mega-malls and multiplex cinemas are everywhere, and foreign franchises like Gap, Abercrombie & Fitch, The Body Shop sit at every new corner.

Karum, is a super-posh mall at the base of the Sheraton hotel in Ankara.

I have many friends there who are involved in leftist politics and the litany of complaints just goes on and on. Turkey is awash with NATO money, condos, malls, resorts are going up everywhere. It’s the usual arguments for globalization, the classes and sectors most closely entrenched with the bureaucracy and with technocrats, profit the most while everyone else seems to experience nothing but diminishing returns. There are now restrictions to access to things like abortions, birth control, the Morning After pill and alcoholic beverages. There are even some shades of lipstick which are now deemed “inappropriate”!

Yoga practitioners are staying put in Gezi Park - from yogadork.com

Most of the Turks I know are very progressive politically and can’t stand what their governments are doing in their name. They don’t like the fact that Erdogan has gotten involved in the mess in Syria. They don’t like the fact that Turkey has such cozy military arrangements with the US and Israel. They don’t like the fact that journalists and activists who call for social reform and more freedom of the press are regularly jailed and imprisoned.

Anyone who reads my blog regularly knows how much of a leftist, anarchist anti-globalization sympathizer I am. I hate the way the world is becoming more generic everywhere with each passing day. The blandness, the uniformity and in the name of “progress”. In that regard, I can understand why someone would become a Luddite. If I go to Japan, I don’t want to get off the plane to see another GAP, identical to the one at home. I want to see all the unique things, the foods, the buildings, the temples, the plants, animals, the geography, the farmer’s markets, the legendary fish markets which make Japan unique in the first place.

This could be, literally anywhere.

It’s not just countries transforming themselves to all look a certain way. I see it in the way people dress too. Everyone pretty much wears the same uniforms now. T-shirt, jeans, sandals/sneakers whether it’s Montreal or Mozambique. Everyone is eating the same food, burgers, sushi, soda pop. Everyone reads the same books, the same best-sellers whether it’s Dan Brown or Stephen King. People are even starting to think the same way and I’m noticing that it’s starting to take even greater reserves of psychic energy to maintain your uniqueness, to stay different and to stay outside the box.

Talk to any scientist with even half a functioning brain and they will be the first ones to tell you that diversity, heterogeneity is a good thing. That having genetic diversity gives organisms genetic strength. That being in a state of homogeneity is dangerous for extended periods of time and leaves the species vulnerable.

This kind of homogeneity is not a good thing.

That if you were to wipe out all varieties of say, rice, but just keep one or two strains for mass agriculture and plant all the fields with these two strains. In case a parasite or fungus is introduced and wipes out these two strains or rice, because you didn’t keep the other varieties which might have been immune to the fungus, you’ve now lost all your rice. That example can easily be extrapolated to humans, our minds, our opinions, our way of life.

Stay unique Folks, these are very homogeneous times.

Why Fighting Fire with Fire will never work (but tea and sympathy might)

A few days ago I was listening to “Day 6″ with Brent Bambury on CBC Radio. Brent always had, and still has, a knack for picking up unusual stories or mainstream media stories but from an unusual angle. This past weekend, he highlighted a news item which has not been picked up by the mainstream media (surprise, surprise) in light of the Woolwich incident. In case you have not heard, Britain has been rocked by anti-Muslim sentiment because of this incident where a machete-yielding hack beheaded an off-duty British soldier in the streets of London. Ultra-right wing groups like the English Defense League (EDL) have come out swinging against Islam and Muslims in general. Hate crimes against Muslims have skyrocketed in recent days across Britain.

There have also been unrelated attacks against nine mosques, including a fire-bombing in Grimsby

The EDL planned mass rallies were around Britain to add fuel to the fire. To the credit of Britons, hardly anyone showed up. In fact former Queen guitarist, now environmentalist, Brian May was leading a protest the same day against the badger cull in the UK and more people showed up for that than the anti-Muslim ones. To my mind, this signals a change of priorities, even if it is a small one.

Queen guitarist/astrophysicist/university chancellor/environmental activist and one of the coolest guys in the world, Brian May led a protest of thousands.

The news item in question which I think deserves more coverage and discussion, involves a tiny dilapidated mosque in York.

The York mosque

The Yorkshire EDL Scarborough Division posted a message on its Facebook page calling for supporters to gather outside the York mosque.

So what did the mosque do?
They invited the protesters to come in for tea and biscuits, which was then followed by a football/soccer match. (You can listen to whole, charming interview here.)

You cannot get more English than tea and biscuits.

Professor Mohammed El-Gomati, a senior member of that mosque, while discussing the impending demonstrations, recalled a quote from the great Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, “That if the Prophet Mohammed were presented with all the problems of the world, he would have solved them over a cup of tea.” Taking that as his cue, the mosque’s congregation decided to face the EDL protesters with the tea, biscuits and an impromptu game of football.

Local politicians and members of clergy from other religions have hailed the gesture unanimously.
Archbishop of York Dr John Sentamu said the mosque’s response was “fantastic”. He said: “Tea, biscuits, and football are a great and typically Yorkshire combination when it comes to disarming hostile and extremist views.”
Father Tim Jones, who went to the Bull Lane mosque, which is situated in his parish, said: “I’ve always known they were intelligent and compassionate people and I think this has demonstrated the extent to which they are people of courage – certainly physical courage and also a high degree of moral courage. I think the world can learn from what happened outside that ramshackle little mosque on Sunday.” Hull Road ward councillor Neil Barnes said it had been a “proud moment for York”.
He said: “I don’t think I’ll ever forget the day that the York Mosque tackled anger and hatred with peace and warmth – and I won’t forget the sight of a Muslim offering a protester tea and biscuits with absolute sincerity.”

The York mosque and congregation on tea and biscuit day.

David Icke, during his Wembley presentation last October said that violent protests usually don’t work and I agree. While I think showing up to demonstrate support for a particular stance whether it is against the Iraq war, or even last weekend’s March Against Monsanto to let politicians and policy-makers know when something isn’t cool, politicians and industrialists will unfortunately keep furthering their own interests. It not only takes an active citizenry but also a sympathetic police force and military/security apparatus to switch sides to carry out real change.

“We need what I call the Non-Comply Dance…where people dance to a different drum, dance to a different beat,…No no more do we comply out of fear of not complying with these dark suits and people, we stop complying but we stop complying with a smile on our face and a heart that’s open, not in anger, not in bitterness, but in steely “We are not having it”. So we hold our vibration and don’t get pulled into their’s …We can go on protests and hurl abuse and stuff like that through our anger, understandably so…but what does it do? What does it achieve? It just feeds the dragon, feeds the demon…so why don’t we think of another way?”

 

An experiment in Earth Healing

This enchanting house is located on an island called Elliðaey near Vestmannaeyjar, a small archipelago off the south coast of Iceland. In 2000 the house was given to singer, Bjork from her motherland as a “Thank You” for putting Iceland on the international map.

I have seen signs. The end of the world as we know it has begun. Don’t panic. It might look terrifying on the surface, but inside every human being is a choice to act out of fear or love. Earth is calling. God is calling. Sky is calling. Creation is calling. Wake up. Wake up now. Generate the capacity for love, for compassion in your heart. Now is the time to yield to the call of growth, to the call of action. You, you are the change makers. Sleepers of all ages, wake up. Wake up now.

- Poem by Icelandic Parliamentarian and WikiLeaks representative, Birgitta Jónsdóttir, on “Democracy Now!” (at 14:58)

Like I posted in one of my very first blog-posts  Iceland is indeed proving itself to be a high-frequency consciousness country over and over again. This is a country that had the foresight to jail their bankers who created the financial meltdown of 2008, then forgave every one of their debt. The result that they are now one of the most financially robust economies in the world. More recently, Iceland has decided to push legislation against internet pornography because of the damaging effects it has on women in the industry as well as the scarring if little-understood effects it has on children who are exposed to this material before they are ready to handle it.

Then I watched the recent interview with   Birgitta Jónsdóttir on “Democracy Now!” linked above and I thought to myself “*THIS* is the kind of politician we need everywhere folks. Now.”

Birgitta Jónsdóttir – Class Act

Can you ever imagine you local politician ever writing something like her poem and then reading it out loud in front of a political prisoner’s jail? None around my neck of the woods, that’s for sure…One of the things I’ve always admired about the Nordic and Scandinavian countries is this very pragmatic outlook they have on things. They don’t give a rat’s ass about politics or stepping on some billionaire or politician’s toes but rather ask “Does this work?” and if it does, employ it and get rid of whatever doesn’t.

Did you know that Iceland grow their own bananas in their greenhouses because it’s cheaper to do so than to import them from overseas? Also the fact that the island is volcanic and geothermally active ensures they have all the cheap heat they need. (Do you see any agro-business or oil companies having a fit now?)

 A few weeks ago Waking Times posted a very interesting article on “How We Create Reality”. Normally, I have a hard time digesting magical thinking and can’t tolerate stuff like “The Secret” or books like those by Og Mandino.

No. Just no.

However this article was a little different in that it addressed how to actually negate poor self-image and also the fact that what other people think of us does end up affecting us, which is why it’s important to drop those frenemies and surround yourself with people who really do have your best interests at heart, an important point which many of these New Age pot boilers fail to mention.

Gwynnie-poo and Madonna, classic frenemies, any wonder why they don’t hang together anymore?

I then thought about  Birgitta’s  poem and what effect , if any, there could be if indeed many people, instead of focusing on complicated systems and complicated daydream scenarios or visions lasting 20 minutes, instead repeatedly focused on one simple image, like the article suggests.

Would it really change anything?

So Shifters, here’s a simple experiment for you, should you want to join in (if you don’t, that’s cool too).

Here’s an innocent image below, all it is a vision of a Tibetan Mandala. Specifically, the Mandala of Auspicious Beginnings . In Mahayana Buddhism, the ideal is the Bodhisattva, one who has taken the vow to become a Buddha, an enlightened one. The maṇḍala, a symbol of the universe in Buddhist cultures, depicts the three great Bodhisattvas who represent the power, wisdom, and compassion of the Buddhas. This maṇḍala was  to invoke the blessings of the Bodhisattvas.
Don’t think about how-tos, wherefores, whys or what-ifs  or any of the rest. Just commit the image to memory and remember it as vividly as you can and remember it several times a day, even for a second or two.  Share it with as many people as you want.

It’s just an experiment, let’s just see where this goes, shall we ?

Joy can’t be bought but selfishness can

If you lose all your money, it’s not such a big deal, you can always start over and earn your way back.
If you lose your name and reputation, it’s harder to get it back, but not impossible as long as your work honestly and ethically to rebuild it.
But if you lose your character, you can never get it back.

-Anonymous

The past few days have been very interesting to observe. Not sure if some of you heard about this, but it would seem a huge cachet of documents have been leaked by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists involving high level personages and secret bank accounts and off-shore accounts of some of the worlds movers and shakers.

Imee Marcos – daughter of Imelda and Ferdinand.
Busted!

What’s interesting is that:
A) the information is coming out now à la Truth Vibrations and
B) it’s really been exposing the magnitude and secret relationships in the international financial and banking cartels and how far these uber-wealthy types will go to hide their fortunes and the legal loopholes they use.

The British Virgin Islands is a tax haven hot-spot.

They make the Nazis who hid their gold in Swiss bank accounts look like troglodytes with respect to the sophistication they now employ. I first heard of the story as a quick news tidbit on CBC radio last week and then the conspiracy websites started picking up the story. Not a single headline in the mainstream media anywhere so of course the usual media black-out is happening. The usual reaction: protect the elites, don’t mention names, pretend nothing happened blah, blah, blah.

It’s also been interesting to observe the media reaction to Margaret Thatcher’s death and the complete disconnect between what the media has been offering (i.e right-wing pundits glorifying what an amazing woman she was) and the real reaction on the streets of the United Kingdom (i.e flat out jubilation).

Personally, she rankled my own anarchist and leftist nerves, just like Ronald Reagan and Brian Mulroney from that decade of greed known as the 1980′s. She put 3 million people out of work, labelled Nelson Mandela as a terrorist (She’s in good company. Dick Cheney did the same thing), and had no problem gallivanting with the likes of General Pinochet of Chile and looking the other way while he killed thousands in Chile.

General Pinochet and Maggie Thatcher – birds of a feather flocking together

What I also find interesting is that Reagan and Thatcher both ended up suffering from severe dementia and/or Alzheimer’s and from what I heard, Mulroney has hit the bottle again…hard.

Reagan, Mulroney and Maggie – Conservatives in force

Meanwhile, you have guys like Fidel Castro, Noam Chomsky and Nelson Mandela still mentally sharp as ever, even at their advanced age…

Mandela and Castro are old friends. While most of the Western world supported the  apartheid years in South Africa, Cuba was one of the very few countries who didn’t.

Politics aside, just thinking out loud but maybe having some concern for a fellow human being might actually have a direct effect on mental and spiritual health? The Greek island of Icaria was once a communist drop-off point, where anarchists, socialists and other leftists were sent off to rot in isolation. The result? Today, Icaria is considered one of the world’s five “Blue Zones” – places where the population regularly lives to an advanced age (one in three make it to their 90s).

Icaria – looks like a great place to live, no?

I really do think greed, selfishness and that so-called “competitive edge” drive to win somehow has a way of shriveling the heart, in contracts blood vessels into the heart and thus, the brain. On the other hand, have you noticed that when you’re being cooperative, giving and selfless, it somehow leads to joy? It expands the heart and dilates your entire being.

I’ve never understood people who are insanely wealthy and powerful who always wanted more. Even while they claim to give generously to charities, I don’t think you can really selectively be a shark-like son-of-a-bitch in your working life and then be some philanthropist during “selective” other moments of your life. It’s a way of being. You’re really one way naturally or the other. Or not.

Corporate douche bag Conrad Black

Even if you have enough to insure that 7 generations after you will be millionaires and never have to worry for anything, when is enough, enough? This insatiability leads me to believe that economic and financial security isn’t really the issue here at all. It’s deeper than that. It’s a sort of sickness. Mentally, something is off. It’s based on fear. It’s not a fear of poverty either. I think it’s a fear of not sticking out anymore, of not being seen, of not being admired by others, of not mattering anymore.

Barbara Amiel – Conrad Black’s wife. She famously quipped to Vogue magazine that she had “an extravagance which knows no bounds”. Read any of her columns and you’ll quickly detect what an ugly person she really is.

I can’t think of a sadder way to live, to have such an insecurity constantly with you. We were never supposed to be defined by what we own and have accumulated. We are supposed to be defined by our actions, what we give and put out there and our experiences. In this respect, I sometimes think some animals are more “human” than humans.

If these examples of animals and cross-species friendships are anything to go by, things are changing in the animal world. That means things can and are going to change in the human world.
Soon.

Dolphin playfully riding a whale, as sighted in Hawaii

When Being Disposable goes too far

I’m so happy that Mercury has now gone direct. It means less breakdown and things finally moving forward. This past Mercury retrograde saw just about all my major appliances break down in one form or another. Rather than give you a boring list of what went wrong, suffice to say that it forced me to take a long, hard look at the finer print of guarantees and warranties of appliances like never before. This coming from a girl who is probably the most useless person you will even encounter when it comes to technical matters and working with tools. (Seriously, even to get my TV hooked up  I need to call someone in.)

That,is so not me though I wish I knew more about using power tools.

Thankfully, I lucked out. I have a penchant for retro and vintage items and styles for bygone eras and a lot of my stuff is actually from the 1960′s and 1970′s which means, that barring throwing them off the CN Tower, they are practically indestructible.

Retro-style aqua fridge. I’ll take mine in white please. (From Bigchill.com)

With a little maintenance and upkeep, they can probably run almost forever. I also like to support local charities, keep landfills clear and keep the underground economy going by frequenting places like thrift shops, second-hand stores, the Salvation Army or Value Village. Plus who can say no to a bargain or finding a treasure?

Brand new travelling bar cocktail set. Retail $160 at
greatgiftsformen.com I found a retro 1960′s one in it’s original leather carrying case for $2.97 at a local thrift shop.

I have friends and family, on the other hand, who are the first ones out the door whenever a new gizmo shows up on the market. I really don’t see the need to buy a fridge that gives me a computer read-out of every item which is running low. I need a fridge which keeps food fresh or frozen. I don’t need a washer and dryer machine which can do algebra homework. I need machines which wash or dry accordingly. I think the list of “special features” as selling points has now gone over to the ridiculous.

I don’t know if you have ever noticed, but clothes dried outside under the sun, somehow always feel crisper and cleaner.

Many companies prey on consumer ignorance and fears. Stuff from the 50′s, 60′s and 70′s usually had 10-year, 25-year guarantees, sometimes even a lifetime guarantee was not unheard off. These days, you’re lucky if you get 1-2 years.

You will probably never see these words again with “Maytag” in your lifetime.

It’s called planned obsolescence. Where companies deliberately design stuff to break down right after the guarantee expires, thus forcing the consumer to go back out and buy something new all over again and repeat the process indefinitely. That’s how they make money. (I always thought it would be cool if some brainy engineering type would finally come up with a company which offered appliances with superior engineering and with a lifetime guarantee or lifetime replacement agreement (for new styles or designs) and retro-fitted appliances with a commitment to really being green. Buy something once and never have to think about it ever again. I’m almost positive they’d overtake the industry completely.)

This got me thinking on a deeper level about what a disposable mindset really means and what it does to people to say nothing of the planet. I mean, I could have just as easily threw everything out and got myself into debt by ordering all this new stuff instead of calling in the repair dude.

Maytag repairman isn’t sad because Maytags are so amazing that they never need fixing. He’s sad because Maytag fired him a long time ago because they don’t want you to call him.

What happens when we take an equally dismissive attitude about disposing relationships and friendships? Disposing hard-won rights? Disposing all too quickly and not thinking of the after-effects when we don’t value things as we should? I think when relationships and human beings get too easy, too disposable, what it really means is that we don’t really need to enter into a meaningful relationship with it. It’s nothing, just get another one. It doesn’t mean anything because you can trash it and replace it, right?

I cited my appliances, but to give you another example, I have a pair of black leather Chelsea boots I bought 13 years ago in Istanbul. These boots have literally taken me all over the world. I have worn them during crucial events in my life. They go with almost everything in my closet. I have had them repaired and resoled many times over and they are still going strong. If they died tomorrow, they would be irreplaceable. Because not only do the shoes go, but so do all the memories, some happy, some bittersweet, some sad which come with them. That’s the kind of stuff that makes us human, not robotic consumers and I really do think we’d all be better off if there was more of the former than the latter.

Where would we be if the Beatles never reintroduced the Chelsea boot to the world?

When Self-hate just becomes Hate

I guess some of you may have already picked this up about me but, I do have a few things which rub me the wrong way like stupidity, obvious dishonesty or evolutionary dumbfuckery of any sort.

This might include (but is not exclusive to) New Age pabulum,

Spiritually and emotionally immature yoga teachers billing themselves as “shamans”,

Instances of gross cultural and religious appropriation,

Homophobia,

Islamophobia,

and being around emotionally constipated Republicans/Conservatives types too long.

One thing which I have noticed about all the aforementioned types is that many of them operate on a level of dishonesty and then expect you to play into their dishonesty with them. That’s also the sign of an abusive personality, that for abuse and dishonesty to continue, you have to almost enter into a silent agreement with the abuser or liar and give them that permission to continue this behavior by staying quiet about it instead of calling them out on it.

Tina Turner had to put up with physical and emotional abuse from Ike Turner for years.

I’m not just talking about cases of shady gurus, sketchy politicians and right-wing pundits.

Right-wing nutjob Ann Coulter and her man-hands

It can be found in all corners in life. For instance, the cardinals have started their conclave today to elect a new Pope. One thing the Church has to deal with is this issue of gay marriage and homosexuality in general.

The Church needs to stop going on about how “abnormal” or “unnatural” homosexuals are when the majority of those same members of clergy are homosexuals themselves. I’ve also noticed this as well, that the most anti-gay politicians usually end up being caught cruising for gay sex at public restrooms and the like.

Former US Senator Larry Craig got caught acting, ahem, in an “animated way” in a public restroom

There’s a huge element of self-hatred there, people who hate or don’t understand and want to deal with an aspect of themselves then externalize that hatred towards others who may demonstrate the same tendencies and by doing that, hoping that what they don’t feel comfortable with in themselves will also go away. This kind of duplicity and dishonesty is the culprit behind who-knows-how-many problems. People need to start getting real with themselves first, I think.

I remember years ago I was quite taken with someone. When I understood that this person had been deliberately hiding his real political views from me (no secret that I have leftist sympathies) and when I saw he was an unadmitted racist with a fetish for “exotic” women, I ended it. The break was civil and with no hard feelings, on my part anyway. Years later, I was walking along the street and noticed a tall, gaunt figure walking towards me coming from the opposite direction, but on the opposite sidewalk. It was raining and he had an umbrella over him. I squinted harder and realized it was this fellow. Then I realized he had been staring at me for quite a long while, peeking from underneath the edge of his umbrella every 2 seconds, thinking that I didn’t see him.

Really?

The second he saw that I saw it was him, he pulled the umbrella quickly over him even lower and practically ran off like a bat out of hell. I stood there perplexed but slightly amused. This person was in his late 30′s, had a PhD from a global Top 20 university, had traveled extensively, is quite (supposedly) erudite, carries a huge amount of responsibility, yet if he wanted to talk to me he could have just said “Hello ____, how are you” and acted normally instead of looking like he was acting out some skit on “The Benny Hill Show” where the guy is hiding in plain view behind a park bench or a tree.

If you turned around and caught someone acting like this, would you take them seriously?

So that night, I shot him an email telling him exactly what I just described, including how ridiculous he looked.
Needless to say, he never wrote back  :-)

Bring on Warp-Speed!

This has been a very interesting month already, no?

First, the Pope decides to step down which has set off a whole slew of questions and theories, everything from the ongoing sex scandals involving priests to Mafia money-laundering operations to imminent arrests over abuses of crimes against humanity.     (Kevin Annett’s website is by far the best one out there if this is something you want to be on top off.)

More and more of the old are going to be facing the end of their roads.

Then there was the meteors hitting Russia and Cuba and the asteroid fly by. The footage caught on film has been nothing short of remarkable and gives first-hand experience of what a sonic boom does. It wasn’t just windows breaking and falling glass injuries. People have reported that some of them, while waiting for the bus to go to work, actually felt the boom, like a pressure hitting them and pushing them back. Storefronts buckled and car tops were pressed down. Looking at the photos of where the meteor landed, it reminds me of that scene in “Superman” when Mr. and Mrs. Kent find Superman as a little boy, by the side of the road.

Mr. and Mrs. Kent finding baby Superman in the film.

Luckily the Russian meteor landed in a remote area and no one was injured.

The Buddhists were right all along. Everything is impermanent and the universe is constantly in a state of flux and change. Who would have thought even a few years ago that we’d live to see the almighty Catholic Church in it’s final and terminal stage? That asteroid fly by was supposed to leave Earth alone. Instead, a rogue meteor coming from the opposite direction, no less, hits Earth within the same 24-hour period. How come not one professional astronomer picked that up given the number of high-powered telescopes around the world? What it showed was that we’re far more vulnerable than we realize or like to think we are.

1980′s Asteroid video game by Atari.

We like to think we’re in such control, don’t we?
A gang of hairless but clever upright-walking apes, who have mastered the use of their thumbs, living on this lonely planet who still can’t figure out how to live peacefully side-by-side, feed, clothe and look after one another irrespective of age, nationality, race, color, religion and gender.

The human race in the future as envisioned in the film “Wall-e”

Instead we come up with even more clever ways of keeping us separated and maintaining control over our fellow human being when the whole thing is a construct which was created by someone, somewhere along the line. Whether it’s the concept of the nation-state, the financial and/or political systems we live with, our sense of economics, even things like marriage and the traditional roles of men and women, just about everything if you place it under enough scrutiny and think about it long and hard enough, is a scam of some sort.

A map of the world from space. “See Mom? No lines”

…and this is what happens when humans get their grubby hands on it and start drawing up lines everywhere and claiming it for their own

Like some of you may have already picked up, I love Star Trek. I’m almost positive that creator Gene Roddenberry must have been trying to channel something to the masses with the show, that there are other ways to live, other ways we can experience the world and the universe around us. (Little known fact: mystic and mathematician Dr. Charles Muses, Linda Goodman’s teacher, was a behind-the-scenes script doctor on several of the most important episodes but declined credit for his work.)

I remember watching the movie “Star Trek – First Contact” when the crew had to literally travel back in Earth time to ensure that Zefram Cochrane’s (the inventor of warp-speed) historic warp-drive test flight actually took place uninterrupted and beat the Borg from taking over Earth. That warp-drive flight was important not only in ensuring that Earth stayed Borg-free but it also precipitated first contact with an alien species. See, Earth, and in particular humans, were considered to be primitive by alien races, like the Vulcans because we had not yet figured out warp-speed (we were a pre-warp speed civilization) and therefore not worthy of paying any attention to. Cochrane’s test flight was picked up by a Vulcan ship who happened to be in the vicinity. Because the Vulcans saw that someone on Earth figured out warp-speed they came down to investigate, therefore first contact was made and this realization that we are not alone in the Universe then led to a complete overhaul of all human perspective abolishing all old systems of economics, politics, religion etc.

Inventor of warp-drive Zefran Cochrane making first contact with Vulcan emissary

The key here is to realize that people finally understood the pursuit of power is a lose-lose situation for everyone involved in the long haul.

Zen Buddhist teacher Alan Watts said it best:

The Karmic Wheel takes another turn

Tibetan Wheel of Life

Holy Crap!
Now things are really starting to get interesting. In case you did not hear, Pope Benedict XVI is resigning. You never heard about a Pope resigning ever before because the last time that happened was over 600 years ago, since it’s an appointment for life. But Ratzy is citing physical and mental incapacity to continue his duties.

As the Italians say “Ciao”

I’m not crazy about him. I have friends who are very progressive Catholic priests and they were horribly disappointed when Benedict got elected since he was known to be an ultraconservative. He was going to, and did, lead the Church back to the Middle Ages. You have to remember Benedict occupied the same office which was held by the Grand Inquisitor, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The name of the office has clearly changed but you get the idea. I do find it amusing that the conspiracy websites and blogs have already started to go into overdrive.

St. Malachy, first Irish saint

Most of it has to do with the prophecies of St. Malachy, an Irish saint and seer who apparently prophesied the identity of the last 112 Popes. According to the traditional account, in 1139, Malachy was summoned to Rome by Pope Innocent II. While in Rome, Malachy purportedly experienced a vision of future popes, which he recorded as a sequence of cryptic phrases. This manuscript was then deposited in the Roman Archive, and thereafter forgotten about until its rediscovery in 1590.

Many people consider the prophecy a hoax since Malachy’s biographer Bernard of Clairvaux makes no mention of it when he published the biography in 1595. Even if it was an elaborate hoax from the 16th century, then why does the list of fake quatrains correspond almost exactly from the 16th century down to Benedict?

I’m not going to replicate Malachy’s entire prophecy but I’ll only highlight the last 100 years:

Pope No.	Translation of Malachy’s motto	Papal Name	Real name	Historical reference or Explanation
260	104 Religion destroyed	Benedict XV (1914–1922)	Giacomo Della Chiesa	Reigned during, but had no influence to stop,World War I. This unprecedented period of violence was mainly fought between the Christian powers of Europe, destroying empires which had lasted centuries and began the worldwide spread of atheistic Communism.
261	105 Intrepid faith	Pius XI(1922–1939)	Achille Ratti	Established Vatican City as a sovereign country with the papal office as head of state.
262	106 Angelic shepherd	Ven. Pius XII (1939–1958)	Eugenio Pacelli	Reigned during World War II, he is reported to have covertly helped Italian Jews escape extermination. Said to have received visions, some of which have yet to be revealed.
263	107 Shepherd and sailor	Bl. John XXIII(1958–1963)	Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli	From Venice, a maritime city.
264	108 Flower of flowers	Paul VI(1963–1978)	Giovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini	His coat of arms featured three fleur-de-lys.
265	109 From the midst of the moon	John Paul I (1978)	Albino Luciani	His month-long reign began with the moon half-full.
266	110 From the labour of the sun	Bl. John Paul II(1978–2005)	Karol Wojtyła	Born on the day of a solar eclipse and entombed on the day of a solar eclipse.
267	111 Glory of the olive.	Benedict XVI (2005–2013)	Joseph Ratzinger	Chose the regnal name Benedict after St Benedict of Nursia, founder of the Benedictine Order. The order’s crest contains an olive branch.
268	112 Peter the Roman, who will nourish the sheep in many tribulations; when they are finished, the city of seven hills will be destroyed, and the dreadful judge will judge his people. The end.	Unknown	Unknown	268

If the prophecies are correct, Pope Benedict is to be the second-to-last Pope. The next pope is to be the last one.

“the city of seven hills will be destroyed, and the dreadful judge will judge his people. The end.”
The seven hills here are a direct reference to Rome, but what’s to be destroyed? The city itself, the Roman Catholic faith or that creepy global thinktank the Club of Rome? I don’t know what’s going to come out of this but the election of the next Pope will be very, very interesting to watch. Maybe nothing will come out of Malachy’s vision.

Prophecies aside, I think the Church may very well disappear in the next few decades anyway only because they will be financially bankrupt due to the sex scandals and litigation fees. Unless they start reforming in drastic ways and accept the ordination of women in the clergy, get rid of the doctrine of enforced celibacy for clergy, accept same-sex marriages, give women back control of their own bodies, open up the Vatican Archives for public scrutiny, come completely clean on their history and abuse of orphans, First Nation’s peoples, unwed mothers and children born out of wedlock, then I’m afraid the declining years and end of this institution is within sight.

If she wants to work and can do a good job in ministry, let her.

It’s a shame because as many horrible abusive priests and clergy there are within the Church (and Benedict knew about them all, he just conveniently had them re-located and shuffled somewhere else,  like what Cardinal Mahoney in the Los Angeles diocese did as well), there are also quite a number of good people and things too.

I’m thinking of the Liberation theologists of Latin America who sided with the poor against armed guerillas  and death squads usually funded by the United States, oftentimes losing their lives in the fight for justice as well.

I’m thinking of Sister Megan Rice, an 82 year old nun who has a habit of jumping fences at nuclear facilities to protest nuclear weapons.

Sister Megan Rice, badassed nun.

There is also a very impressive intellectual history. Great minds like Pierre de Teilhard de Chardin, Hildegarde of Bingen, and even J.R.R Tolkien. He was a devout Catholic. If you watch or read the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, there is a very Catholic aesthetic and atmosphere to it. Like him or hate him, Michael Moore is also a practicing Catholic and the morning before he won his Oscar for “Bowling for Columbine” and chastised Bush in front of the world for what he did in Iraq, he spent it at Mass. His work is deeply informed by his Catholic background.

Spiritual art of Hildegarde of Bingen

Most of my primary and secondary education was done at Catholic schools which is why I know a lot about it. I know first-hand that there are good people there. I’m thinking of the late Father Mathias, a Capuchin monk from India and guardian of the House of the Virgin Mary at Ephesus who was unfailingly generous with his time with me. I’m thinking of the Catholic nun who attuned me to Reiki so that I could use it with patients when I visited the cancer wards. It would seem that inside the Church, like any other institution, power seems to screw up the minds and hearts of those at the top. Let it go on too long and rot sets in.

Maybe David Icke may turn out to be right after all (especially from 4:20 onwards).