Caller: John In California
Sharing Conversation with John Kaminski
Sharing Conversation with John Kaminski
“Res Ipsa Loquitur” -- “The Thing Speaks For Itself”
The White House
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
April 03, 2012
Presidential Proclamation -- Education and Sharing Day, U.S.A., 2012
EDUCATION AND SHARING DAY, U.S.A., 2012
- - - - - - -
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
A PROCLAMATION
For centuries, the pursuit of knowledge and the cultivation of character have driven American progress and enriched our national life. On Education and Sharing Day, U.S.A., we renew our commitment to these timeless aspirations, and we rededicate ourselves to fostering in our sons and daughters inquiring minds and compassionate hearts.
In a global economy where more than half of new jobs will demand higher education or advanced training, we must do everything we can to equip our children with the tools for success. Their journey begins early, and it demands stewardship from throughout the community -- from parents and caregivers who inspire a love of learning to teachers and mentors who guide our children along the path to achievement. Our Nation's prosperity grows with theirs, and by ensuring every child has access to a world class education, we reach for a brighter future for all Americans.
Yet, we also move forward knowing we cannot secure the promise of tomorrow through formal education alone. With each generation, our Nation has confronted questions that tested the quality and character of our people. We have borne witness to seemingly insurmountable problems of inequality, oppression, or dire circumstance at home and abroad, and where we have recognized injustice, the way forward has not always been clear. Time and again, during moments of trial, Americans have demonstrated a fundamental commitment to compassion, cooperation, and goodwill toward others -- doing not what is easy, but what is right. These qualities have come to define us, and as we prepare today's students to become tomorrow's leaders, let us nourish in them the virtues that have sustained our country for generations.
On Education and Sharing Day, U.S.A., we reflect on the teachings of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the Lubavitcher Rebbe, who embodied that humanitarian spirit. As a tireless advocate for youth around the world, he inspired millions to lift the cause of education, to practice kindness and generosity, and to aspire toward their highest ideals. His enduring legacy lives on in those he touched, and today, we resolve to carry forward his dedication to service and scholarship.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim April 3, 2012, as Education and Sharing Day, U.S.A. I call upon all Americans to observe this day with appropriate ceremonies and activities.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this third day of April, in the year of our Lord two thousand twelve, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-sixth.
BARACK OBAMA
<|>
“You never know when your time is coming. Like birds suddenly caught in a trap, like fish caught up in a net, we are trapped at some evil moment when we least expect it.”
Ecclesiastes 9:12
<|>
GlobalResearch.ca
"RESPONSIBILITY TO PROTECT" SYRIA: A US-NATO "TROJAN HORSE"
"Friends of Syria" Sabotage UN "Peace Plan"
By Carla Stea
Kofi Annan, Special Envoy for the United Nations and Arab League stated, in his remarks to the United Nations informal session of the General Assembly, April 6, 2012: “I ask all States with influence on the parties in Syria to use it now to ensure an end to the bloodshed and the beginning of dialogue.” Annan stated that, the Syrian government having agreed to withdraw troops from population centers by April 10, “a cessation of violence is demanded of the opposition by April 12,” and he twice stated: “I call upon all parties with influence on the opposition to urge that they also cease all violence.” United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon stated, in his opening remarks to that meeting: “Further militarization of the conflict is not a solution,” and Qatar’s ambassador Nasser Abdulaziz Al-Nasser, President of the General Assembly, acknowledged that the ramifications of policies: “depending on what comes next, could have an impact on the whole region.” According to The New York Times description of the April 1 “Friends of Syria,” meeting in Istanbul:
“The United States and dozens of other countries moved closer on Sunday to direct intervention in the fighting in Syria, with Arab nations pledging $100 million to pay opposition fighters, and the Obama administration agreeing to send ‘communication equipment to help the rebels organize and evade Syria’s military’…the moves reflected a growing consensus, at least among the officials who met here under the rubric “Friends of Syria,” that mediation efforts by the United Nations peace envoy Kofi Annan, were failing to end the violence….With Russia and China blocking United Nations measures that could open the way for military action, the countries lined up against the government of President Bashar al-Assad sought to bolster Syria’s beleaguered opposition through means that seemed to stretch the definition of humanitarian assistance and blur the line between so-called lethal and non-lethal support.”
Although this is a surprisingly candid disclosure by The New York Times concerning the nature of “support” for the Syrian opposition, the Times article apparently misses the point. In fact, it is the threat that UN Special Envoy Kofi Annan might succeed in bringing about some form of cessation of violence in Syria, without demanding regime change, that motivates the “Friends of Syria” commitment of financial and military aid for the Syrian opposition on April 1, ten days before the deadline set by Kofi Annan for Syrian government withdrawal from population centers (a deadline initially accepted by the Syrian government) and 12 days before the demand that the opposition similarly cease all forms of violence. In one stroke, on April 1, the Friends of Syria’s commitment of financial and military aid to the opposition eliminated any incentive or need for the opposition to enter into dialogue with the Syrian government, which would be the first step toward peace in that country. “Leading from behind,” US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared, at a press conference that day: “Assad must go.”
Assured of massive external support that might enable them to fight successfully to overthrow the government of Assad, the Al-Qaeda infiltrated opposition has every reason for confidence in ultimate victory, and has every reason for sabotaging the success of Kofi Annan’s efforts. So far, the United Nations has failed to support or provide legal justification for the military intervention that would be required to overthrow the government of Assad, and the Presidential Statements unanimously issued by the Security Council support Kofi Annan’s six point proposal, which omits the requirement that Assad relinquish power, and demands that both the Syrian government and the opposition engage in dialogue. The Security Council Presidential Statement contains calls for a “mechanism to monitor the end of violence,” and Syria’s government welcomed the arrival of the UN team, led by Norwegian Major General Robert Mood, to prepare for the deployment of observers. There is, however, an Achilles’ heel in the April 5th Security Council Presidential Statement which concludes: “The Security Council requests the Envoy to update the council on the cessation of violence in accordance with the above timeline, and progress toward implementation of his six-point proposal in its entirety. In the light of these reports, the Security Council will consider further steps as appropriate.” What those “further steps” will be is not made explicit. However, in the context of history, it does not take much imagination to recognize the potential (and probably intended) threat contained in the final sentence of UNSC Presidential Statement S/PRST/2012/10.
On February 17, the United States Director of National Intelligence, James R. Clapper, told Congress that Syrian opposition groups have been infiltrated by Al-Qaeda, allegations that are confirmed by the leader of Al-Qaeda, Ayman-al-Zawahri declaring his support for the Syrian opposition, and exhorting Muslims in Turkey, Iraq, Lebanon and Jordan to aid the Syrian rebels. The “Friends of Syria” pledge of support to the Syrian opposition is no less than support for increased action by terrorists, now unabashedly encouraged by the US commitment of aid to the Anti-Assad forces.
On April 4th, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stated: “Everybody backed Kofi Annan’s peace plan. Then all of a sudden another meeting of the Friends of Syria group makes decisions urging the Syria opposition to refuse negotiations and arm, promising new sanctions against Syria.” On April 7, President Assad stated that terrorist acts had increased, stating: “The terrorist acts committed by the armed terrorist groups in Syria have increased during the last few days, particularly after reaching an understanding on Kofi Annan’s plan,” said Assad’s letter to the United Nations Secretary General and President of the UN Security Council. On March 21, the Security Council had issued a press statement condemning the terrorist attacks that occurred in Damascus on 17th and 19th March, and in Aleppo on March 18. However, according to background reports, the UK President of the Security Council for March refused to agree to the press statement urged by the Russian Federation, condemning the terrorist attacks, until Russia agreed to support the Presidential Statement, the same day, threatening the “further steps.” If true, this alleged blackmail of Russia, withholding condemnation of terrorism to force Russia’s acceptance of the “further steps,” raises serious questions about the motive of the Security Council President who was, very likely acting at the behest of the US/NATO states supporting the Syrian opposition, and their admittedly terrorist members.
Escalating terrorist action, in the days just preceding the April 10th deadline inevitably provokes the Syrian government, and as bloodshed continues, the Syrian government is now requiring a written commitment by the opposition of support for the peace plan drawn up by Kofi Annan. One could make a strong case that the April 1 Friends of Syria declaration of financial and military support for the opposition was deliberately intended to sabotage Kofi Annan’s efforts for a cease-fire and negotiated peace, and set the stage for civil war, which will be portrayed, inevitably as the responsibility of the Syrian government. At this point the now infamous “Responsibility to Protect” (R2P) will be invoked.
http://ecriegel.blogspot.com/2012/04/8-to-them-were-all-slaves-or-worse.html
The E. C. Riegel Blog
#8 To Them, We're All Slaves … or Worse.
The E. C. Riegel Blog
#8 To Them, We're All Slaves … or Worse.
Required reading:
The Babylonian Woe by David Astle
The Money Creators by Gertrude Coogan
Both are available on-line.
“In the 1700's (18th century and before), the elites viewed all indentured servants as “slaves” - humans that they viewed as commodities. More than half of all white immigrants to England's North America colony during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were indentured servants. The elites granted freedom to both black and white indentured servants after serving a specified length of time, typically seven years. The indentured servants lived, worked and socialized together, apparently indifferent to skin color distinctions. The colonial elites, a definite minority, grew concerned about a potential rebellion from the majority non-voting lower economic classes. Consequently they enacted legal measures to divide the poor whites and blacks and gradually the slaves' mutual acceptance of each other subsided. Society was largely composed of servants, landless tenants or small yoeman who owned inconsequential pieces of land that the elite simply did not want. The elites established a “divide and conquer” tactic that still exists in most of the industrial and third world cultures.”
Deanna Spingola
The Ruling Elite: a history of imperialism, genocide and emancipation. Page 197
A slave is by usual definition, someone or even something, which depends on a master for direction, a livelihood or utilitarian usefulness. Human slaves are also by definition owned and therefore can be bought or sold. If a person or thing is no longer useful, its owners can choose to discard it; to enjoy the “freedom” of the proverbial societal dung heap, be that the heap of cast off humanity or the scrap heap of discarded articles or machines. Trouble is, even the elites have some guilty consciousness that what they are doing is wrong and therefore they will seek to cover up or eliminate the effects of their discarding of humanity that they can no longer find any use for, usually by resorting to genocide.
The word indentured does imply that one has had a bit through the teeth installed as if a human being were nothing more than a draft animal to be led around without protest. Looking into it a little farther, one asks just how one became “indentured” to another in the first place, and it turns out that in many cases people were forced into servanthood; slavery, through becoming ensnared in debt, either personally or through the actions of another family member.
Another class of people thought that their servanthood would be temporary; involving learning a trade that would enable them to become their own master someday, escape slavery, and in turn hire other indentured servants to help carry on and expand their trade or business. Somehow, if slavery were just a temporary thing, perhaps it was endurable or worth putting up with without protest.
We would be failing to be consistent were we not to include here mentioning some religious teachings regarding slavery as sanctioned by divine authority; the claim was that in the scheme of things, one's deity was pretty much the same as one's earthly masters. People then as now are often willing to forgo temporary hardships for eventual independence, or some glory in the hereafter, even when such promises are pretty uncertain.
We note in particular the trend some have followed in recent years to try and re-educate themselves so they can get a better job, only to discover that once educated (and in debt), that there are no jobs available for them because the potential employers have outsourced and offshored those jobs to people who require far less to live on than they do. Many of these people are discovering that their academic transcripts, which prove their qualifications for a job, are not available to them unless or until they have paid off their student loans. For these people, caught in a financial Catch-22, it is as if they never attended school and received their degree or whatever other professional certification; all their time and effort and the money they now owe, went for nothing.
In the short run or the long run, it makes no difference, the elites who always had the money, usually acquired through unscrupulous or otherwise despicable trading practices involving precious metals, weapons, slaves and drugs, have had things running their way from time immemorial. These are the people who run things, decide which heroes shall be set up for the common people to look up to, decide which attitudes shall be promoted and which discouraged, decide who gets what and from whom whatever of value is taken (usually stolen by force, requiring the complicity of others who are likely themselves slaves) for the continued preservation and further enrichment of themselves.
It does not matter what colour your skin is, where you come from or even how well educated you think you are. As long as there can be a distinction between slave and free, and there still is, there can be no fundamental change. Hence it is best to begin to recognize where the true divide lies; between the elites and the rest of us, regardless of our race or ethnic background, for to the elite, anyone but themselves is barely human, and being barely human, can be easily discarded.
Obviously the aware mind reels at such things, that indeed there even can be distinctions made between people who are “special” simply because they are rich and those who are not. Yet it has always been so and we contend that without a vital change in awareness among the vast majority of people, there is no reason why these distinctions will not continue and as they do so, bring about destruction and despair to more and more people everywhere as the elite attempts it's grandest scheme of all; the erection of a triplicity of world government, world economy and world religion which they intend on controlling to suit themselves.
[Read more at link above...]
Amazon.com
(Utopianism & Communitarianism)
The Concept of Utopia
(1991)
In this highly influential book, Ruth Levitas provides us with an excellent introduction to the meaning and importance of the concept of utopia, and explores a wealth of material drawn from literature and social theory to illustrate its rich history and analytical versatility. Situating utopia within the dynamics of the modern imagination, she examines the ways in which it has been used by some of the leading thinkers of modernity: Marx, Engels, Karl Mannheim, Robert Owen, Georges Sorel, Ernst Block, William Morris, and Herbert Marcuse. Utopia remains the most potent secular concept for imagining and producing a 'better world', and this classic text will be invaluable to students across a wide range of disciplines.
About the Author
Ruth Levitas is Professor of Sociology at the University of Bristol. She is co-founder and former chair of the Utopian Studies Society (Europe) and vice-chair of the William Morris Society. Her books include The Ideology of the New Right, The Interpretation of Official Statistics (co-edited with Will Guy), The Inclusive Society? Social Exclusion and New Labour, and Poverty and Social Exclusion in Britain (co-edited with Christina Pantazis and David Gordon). Utopia as Method: The Imaginary Reconstitution of Society, the sequel to this book, is forthcoming.
(Utopianism and Communitarianism)
Travels in Icaria
Cabet's Utopia, at first glance, seems to be a bland sort of communistic Eden. The populace shares in the wonderful wealth of Icaria's agriculture and industry, with universal education and general good health. Equality of the sexes is given, and the arts and sciences flourish. At one oddly prescient point, the narrator notes the many contributions made by women in fields including astronomy - I'm told that, today, astronomy is among the most female-friendly of scientific fields. And, in a passage that I found remarkable for its 1840 authorship, we learn that the Icarians not only tolerate mixed-race couplings, but encourage them. On the whole, though, it looks a lot like Morris's News from Nowhere or any of many other socialist Utopia stories, complete with a drippy and over-heated romance.
Still, it doesn't take long for the chill to set in. Central administrators provide equally for all - identically, in fact, with little regard for individual difference of preference. Women make all the same contributions to law, medicine, and commerce as men, but in courts, hospitals, and businesses of their own - very nearly a parallel society, segregated by sex, conjuring all the worst of how "separate but equal" policies work in practice. The arts flourish under Icarian commissars. As in Plato's Republic, however, they are commissioned by the state and rigidly selected (censored) for uplifting content. Literature, for example, comes only from state-sponsored and state-trained litterateurs. The whole region is intensely cultivated by Icarian agriculture, as was done in Herland. This showed no apparent regard for preservation of natural areas, and took positive glee in extinction of animals deemed un-necessary or counter to human good. In manufacturing industries, the Icarian narrator cheerily describes how an individual artisan masters the creation of some sub-assembly or the execution of some process in constructing a complex product. Glowing words aside, it perfectly summarizes assembly-line hell, which we now understand as monotonous and dehumanizing. Their pageants seem familiar to modern readers, too. Thousands participate in days-long celebrations, where music, song, and drama all celebrate the marvel that was their revolution. So many people are involved in these productions that one wonders who was left to get regular work done while the show was being prepared, and who was left to watch once it started. The huge scale and exclusively patriotic content bring to mind North Korean events of our age, vast displays of wealth and opulence presented to a starving populace.
Cabet unwittingly assembled the worst kind of totalitarian state from the dregs of every other thinker of his time, and wrapped the package in cheery slogans built on assumptions that have not worked out in practice. Utopian thinkers have a duty to themselves to see just how horribly the best of intentions can miscarry.
-- wiredweird
France and the Spanish Civil War
(2011)
In this wide-ranging study of French intellectuals who represented the Spanish Civil War as it was happening and in its immediate aftermath, Martin Hurcombe explores the ways in which these individuals addressed national anxieties and shaped the French political landscape. Bringing together reportage, essays, and fiction by French supporters of Franco's Nationalists and of the Spanish Republic, Hurcombe shows the multifaceted ways in which that conflict impacted upon French political culture, arguing that French cultural representations of the war often served to articulate a utopian image of one or the other Spain, a model behind which the radical right and radical left in France might mobilise. His book will be of interest not only to scholars of French literature and culture but also to those interested in how events unfolding in Spain found an echo in the political landscapes of other countries.
(Utopianism and Communitarianism)
Female Rule in Chinese and English Literary Utopias
(1995)
An analysis of the theme of female rule in widely varying historical and cultural Chinese and English utopian texts of the last five centuries. The works examined include Edmund Spenser's "The Faerie Queene", Luo Maodeng's "Sanbao's Expedition to the Western Ocean", and Florence Dixie's "Gloriana".
(Utopianism and Communitarianism)
Zion City, Illinois: Twentieth-Century Utopia
(1996)
An article from: Society for Utopian Studies
Reinterpreting Oscar Wilde's Concept of Utopia: 'The Soul of Man Under Socialism'
(2005)
(Cambridge Studies in Romanticism)
Ideology and Utopia in the Poetry of William Blake
(1998)
Scholars have often drawn attention to William Blake's unusual sensitivity to his social context. In this book, Nicholas Williams situates Blake's thought historically by showing how through the decades of a long and productive career, Blake consistently responded to the ideas, writing, and art of contemporaries. Williams presents detailed readings of several of Blake's major poems alongside Rousseau's Emile, Wollstonecraft's Vindication of the Rights of Women, Paine's Rights of Man, Burke's Reflections of the Revolution in France, and Robert Owen's Utopian experiments. In doing so, he offers revealing new insights into key Blake texts and draws attention to their inclusion of notions of social determinism, theories of ideology-critique and utopian traditions. Williams argues that if we are truly to understand ideology as it relates to Blake, we must understand the practical situation in which the ideological Blake found himself. His study is a revealing commentary on the work of one of our most challenging poets.
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William Blake's unusual sensitivity to social context has often been noted. Nicholas Williams situates Blake's thought historically by examining detailed readings of Blake's major poems alongside such contemporary parallels as Rousseau's Emile, Wollstonecraft's Vindication of the Rights of Woman and Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France. The author offers revealing new insights into key Blake texts and draws attention to their inclusion of social determinism, theories of ideology-critique and traditions of twentieth-century utopias.
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"His discussion of Blake and gender, his comparison of the Blakean view of history to Burkean historiography, and his placing of Blake's apocalyptic works and his Jerusalem in critical juxtaposition to The Rights of Man and to Robert Owens's experiments in early socialism allow us to read Blake in a context that is all too often ignored in Blake studies." Joseph W. Childers
---
Professor Williams has created a timely and insightful commentary on Blake's world. A must read for any fan of Blake's. (from a new fan of Williams')
Ne plus ultra
(Concepts in Social Thought)
Utopianism
(1991)
Utopia has become a vague term, synonymous almost with the Good Society or the Good Time. It is applied to the dreams and visions of all peoples and all times: from backward-looking myths of the Golden Age to the future prospect of a glorious Millennium, from Paradise Lost to Paradise Regained. This book argues that utopia should be seen as a much more specific tradition of social and political thought. It has cultural and historical boundaries. A Western concept, it arose in the West as a specific and highly original way of dealing with the novel problems of modern Western society. Its themes are the characteristic ones of modern Western social thought: power, inequality, democracy, science. But, as a form of imaginative fiction, its treatment of these themes is distinctive and compelling. Far from being merely fantasy or wish-fulfillment, utopia is a critical rehearsal of the dilemmas of modern society and, at the same time, a prescriptive account of the best way of resolving them. From its first appearance in the "Utopia" of Thomas More in 1516, utopia has undergone numerous changes of focus and concern. But its form has remained remarkably resilient. As we approach the end of the second Christian millennium, there are clear signs - for example the emergency of feminist and ecological utopias - that utopia has by no means exhausted is power either as a tool of critical analysis or as a constructive vision of future possibilities.
About the Author
Krishan Kumar was Professor of Social Thought at the University of Kent at Canterbury
The Library and the Workshop: Social Democracy and Capitalism in the Knowledge Age
(2009)
This book offers a detailed account of the way that social democracy today makes sense of capitalism. In particular, it challenges the idea that social democracy has gone "neoliberal," arguing that so-called Third Way policies seem to have brought out new aspects of a thoroughgoing social interventionism with roots deep in the history of social democracy. Author Jenny Andersson expertly develops the claim that what distinguishes today's social democracy from the past is the way that it equates cultural and social values with economic values, which in turn places a premium on individuals who are capable of succeeding in the knowledge economy. Offering an insightful study of Britain's New Labour and Sweden's SAP, and of the political cultural transformations that have taken place in those countries, this is the first book that looks seriously into how the economic, social, and cultural policies of contemporary social democracy fit together to form a particular understanding of capitalism and capitalist politics.
“Excellently conceived and tightly focused, The Library and the Workshop is an original and illuminating analysis of the contemporary transformations of northern European social democracy in progress since the 1980s. It provides a sympathetic but telling explanation of what exactly the exponents of ‘Third Way’ politics think they are trying to achieve.”
—Geoff Eley, University of Michigan
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"No serious scholar interested in social democratic 'modernization' can ignore this book. Where others have found 'betrayals' or 'necessary breaks', Jenny Andersson provocatively reveals the lineages of the Third Way in social democratic ideological traditions."
—Magnus Ryner, Oxford Brookes University
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“I give this book 5 stars because the author is extremely intelligent and knowledgeable. The book is very well written and for the most part enjoyable to read. However, it is too academic and abstract for my purposes. I was looking for much more information about how mixed economies and social democracies actually work and what particular changes have been suggested.”
--doug k
About the Author
Jenny Andersson is a researcher at the Centre d'études et des recherches internationales, Institut de sciences politiques, Paris. She is the author of Between Growth and Security: Swedish Social Democracy From a Strong Society to a Third Way (2007).
Three Dead Words
March 25/11 Canada’s Ritual Abuse Queen Abducts British Columbia Native Children in 1964
Gnostic Liberation Front
THE STRANGE SAD SAGA OF SAINT SIMON OF TRENT
A Child Murder Case From Long Ago
By Harrell Rhome, M.Div., Ph.D.
The Two Admirals: A Tale of the Sea
By James Fenimore Cooper
(1852)
This is a pre-1923 historical reproduction that was curated for quality. Quality assurance was conducted on each of these books in an attempt to remove books with imperfections introduced by the digitization process. Though we have made best efforts - the books may have occasional errors that do not impede the reading experience. We believe this work is culturally important and have elected to bring the book back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide.
About the Author
James Fenimore Cooper was born in 1789 in New Jersey, the son of a wealthy land agent who founded Cooperstown in New York State. Cooper attended Yale, but was expelled in 1805 and spent five years at sea on merchant then naval ships. He married in 1811, and eventually settled in New York. Precaution, Cooper's first novel, was written in 1820 as a study of English manners; its successors, The Spy and The Pilot, written within the next three years, were more characteristic of the vein of military or seagoing romance that was to become typical of him. In 1823 he began the Leatherstocking Tales series of novels, centred on a shared Native American character at different periods of his life, for which he is chiefly remembered. Cooper's reputation as one of America's leading authors was quickly established, and spread to Europe by a long stay there from 1826, making him one of the first American writers popular beyond that country. After his return to America in 1832, however, conservative political essays and novels dramatising similar views, as well as critiques of American society and abuses of democracy, led to a decline in his popularity. James Fenimore Cooper died in 1851.
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On any thinking man's short list of great male bonding novels there has to stand THE TWO ADMIRALS: A TALE OF THE SEA.
It plays out mainly on land in or at sea near Devon during the exciting British summer of 1745, though not written and published until 1842. You will not be wrong it you read THE TWO ADMIRALS for its young romance, clouded ancestries, its political intrigue and intricacies of ship building and seamanship, naval warfare, tactics and strategy -- all served up complete with the attitudes and superstitions of seaman and their leaders. But you would miss the forest for the trees if you did not see that this is the story of the warm love that two heroic men bear down the decades one for the other.
Both men, Richard Bluewater and Gervaise Oakes, would have been born into wealth in England around 1690. Fresh from school at ages 12 or 13, they entered the lowermost rung of the Royal Navy, not long after independent Scotland and England had been -- on paper at least -- submerged in a new country, The United Kingdom. From their first meeting until death parted them after a great jointly won sea victory over the French in 1745, the two friends were inseparable, though of notably different physiques, temperaments and, over time, political loyalties.
As young officers their sea colleagues styled them Pylades and Orestes. As they rose steadily through the ranks they became "the Twin Admirals." In youth the two lifelong bachelors had both loved the same woman, who, long dead, now casts her shadow between them in 1745. Possibly because he ardently supports the imported German House that succeeded the native Stuart monarchs, Vice Admiral Sir Gervaise Oakes now outranks Rear Admiral Richard Bluewater (or "Blue" as his men affenctionately style him). For in the court of King George II, Bluewater, although discreetly silent, is suspected, rightly, of wishing the Stuarts back on the throne of the U. K.
In July 1745 the Young Pretender, Prince Charles Edward Stuart, landed in Scotland and soon raised many highland clans in support of the claims of his father, the Old Pretender, James Edward, son of deposed King James II. Not many days later a fleet of 16 British warships led by the two admirals had dropped anchors in an obscure port on the southern coast of Devon. Its leader, Vice Admiral Sir Gervaise Oakes, in possession of intelligence that the French might soon attempt some mischief in Scotland, had anticipated orders and sailed back from six months patrolling the Bay of Biscay.
Almost immediately word comes that Bonnie Prince Charlie is afoot in Scotland, and a beautiful decades long friendship is sorely strained. Rear Admiral Bluewater refuses to accept an honor offered by George II, the Knighthood of the Garter. Only from England's legitimate King, James Edward, could he accept such preferment. Indeed, the junior admiral is all for resigning his commission and racing north to join Bonnie Prince Charles!
Meanwhile Vice Admiral Oakes with half his ships sails out just before a serious storm to confront a superior French fleet. He trusts that his friend Richard's brain will prevail over his political emotions and will fight the French even if the wrong king is on the throne in London. But a wily Jacobite supporter of the Stuarts persuades Admiral Blue that the French are sailing to prevent King George II's son from returning from warring in the continent, and bringing German mercenaries with him to fight the Stuart rising. Blue feels that the coming civil war should involve only Britons. Hence he is tempted not to follow orders at a critical time in the battle, unless his friend Gervaise's ships should bite off more than they can chew -- as they do.
At the last possible moment, Blue throws his ship between his apparently doomed friend and the French flagship. In person, muttering about wiping out personal dishonor, Blue leads boarders onto the French vessel and captures it. He is then mortally wounded by a spiteful throwaway shot from a French marine, whose life he then saves from irate British sailors. Carried back to shore and the cliffs of Devon, the Rear Admiral lingers near death for days. Meanwhile, contrary to law and custom, and never again repeated in British maritime history, the flags of both admirals fly over Bluewater's ship, the Caesar.
On land, the dying hero takes leave of friends, of a just discovered niece whom he causes to be wed beside his deathbed, of the captains of the fleet and, finally, of his oldest and dearest friend, Sir Gervaise Oakes. Over days they had reminisced together over early amours and careers. Galleygo, the Vice Admiral's steward, who has known and loved both admirals since they were boys, retells to the dying Bluewater details of their last joint victory over the French.
The personal religion of both heroes had been shaped by the direct impact of God on them made visible in the power and majesty of the sea. Neither was a great churchman or inclined to spend time puzzling over dogmas. Both accepted, however, Sir Gervaise's view: "'Friends must meet again, hereafter, Bluewater; it is irrational to suppose that they who have loved each other so well in this state of being, are to be forever separated in the other." The Vice Admiral then "turned aside and wept." The dying man made one last request of his old friend: "'Kiss me, Oakes,' murmured the Rear-Admiral" (Ch. 30) And Gervaise bestowed a kiss on his friend's cheek.
The next and final chapter of THE TWO ADMIRALS takes place in Westminster Abbey in London. Octogenarian Admiral Oakes, long retired and his mind and memory nearly gone, is led by a young protege and by the faithful steward Galleygo, both of whom had participated in the great sea victory of 1745, to the tomb of Rear Admiral Bluewater. Other players from the summer of Bonnie Prince Charlie, by coincidence, are also present. Along with the feeble old Admiral, all fell on their knees to pray. The old man's heart then stopped. "He had lived his time, and supplied an instance of the insufficiency of worldly success to complete the destiny of man ... (Ch. 31).
There is much more to this grand tale than a simple retelling of David and Jonathan, of Pylades and Orestes and of Richard and Gervaise. But this dimension: the thoroughly masculine love of the twin admirals, may be more than enough to persuade you to read THE TWO ADMIRALS: A TALE OF THE SEA.
-OOO-
(Audel Technical Trades Series)
Millwrights and Mechanics Guide
Respected by generations of skilled workers, Audel Millwright's and Mechanic's Guide is the only trade manual to cover maintenance and troubleshooting for all the mechanical trades in a single volume. Now available in hardcover, it covers the newest equipment on shop floors as well as older machinery, sometimes more than 30 years old, for which little maintenance and repair information remains available. Millwrights, mechanics, machinists, carpenters, pipe fitters, electricians, engineers, and those who supervise them will find this book invaluable.
The only hardcover maintenance and repair manual to cover all the mechanical trades in one guide
This updated guide covers new industrial machinery as well as 30-year-old equipment for which little information can be found
Essential for those who repair machinery as well as machinists, carpenters, pipe fitters, electricians, millwrights, mechanics, engineers, mechanical technicians, industrial maintenance managers, and construction tradespeople
This hardcover edition of Audel Millwright's and Mechanic's Guide is as valuable to today's skilled workers as previous editions were to their fathers and grandfathers.
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Find the answer every time
Here, in concise, straightforward language, is the guidebook your father trusted, completely overhauled and updated for the first time in three decades. Clearly organized to help you find what you need, it covers tools, drawing and sketching, measuring and connecting, installation, bearings, motor maintenance, electrical devices, structural steel, and more. Everything about the newest equipment is here, as well as information vital to maintaining the older machinery still found in many shops.
Apply the right method of installation for various types of machinery and equipment
Install, repair, and maintain chain drives and V-belt drives
Perform preventive and predictive motor maintenance
Understand and maintain wet and dry pipe sprinkler systems
Troubleshoot and repair pumps, air compressors, fans, and blowers
Create and use sheet metal patterns
Sharpen hand saws, band saws, and circular saws
About the Authors
Thomas Bieber Davis is a mechanical engineer and trainer in preventive and predictive maintenance at all levels. He has also developed preventive maintenance products for industrial use.
Carl A. Nelson wrote numerous practical manuals for the mechanical trades, including earlier editions of this book, before his death in 1993.
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I bought this book new about thirty years ago. It was $11 then, if I remember right. I ordered it from a catalog; amazon.com and home computers didn't exist. So the edition I am writing about is the one thirty years ago.
This book contains all the hints and kinks and even secrets about setting up machinery that you would normally have to learn by working with someone experienced who knows what he is doing.
The book touches on just about everything. The rigging section tells about how to take care of rope, how to tie knots, how to estimate the weight of something by lifting it with a pinch bar. There is a blacksmith section showing the tools used and some basic forging techniques.
There is a lot of discussion of power transmission, such as flat belts, V belts, shafts, bearings, couplings and such. It shows how to align an electric motor so that the pulleys on the motor and the machine will be in line with each other.
This is not a project book. It doesn't have plans on how to build something. But if you have a machine like a hammer mill, a lathe, an air compressor, a blower, a furnace, or whatever, big and mean, this book shows how to put a sling on it, lift it with a crane, move it, build a floor to put in on, put it where you want it, line it with other machines, put a motor on it, line up the pulleys to power it up, bolt it down, lubricate it, and even a little about how to build a roof over it.
You will have to have a big pocket to put this book in.
--Valerie
PHOSPHATIDYL SERINE A REMEDY TO REPAIR AND PREVENT BRAIN DAMAGE
THE GREATEST "SCIENTIFIC" FLUORIDE FRAUD YET?
Next World TV
Moringa Tree Seeds Purify Water
World's Most Useful Tree
This article can be found at www.Gizmag.com
March 7, 2010
Tree Seeds Could Provide Low-cost Water Purification For Developing Nations
By Ben Coxworth
“In the developing world, more than 1 billion people cannot get clean drinking water... The United Nations says that dirty water causes 80 percent of diseases in the developing world, and kills 10 million people annually.” Those sobering lines are from the United Nations’ website, and underscore just how urgently needed water purification is in much of the world. What many people don’t realize, however, is that there are already naturally-occurring water filtration supplies available in many of these areas. They come in the form of seeds from the Moringa oleifera tree, and used properly, they can produce a 90.00 to 99.99% bacterial reduction in previously untreated water.
The purification process involves grinding Moringa seeds into a paste, mixing that paste with untreated water, waiting for the paste particles to bind with the impurities and settle to the bottom, and then decanting or siphoning the pure water off the top. The entire process is actually quite involved, so the resultant drinkable water would still be a pretty precious commodity.
"This technique does not represent a total solution to the threat of waterborne disease," stated Michael Lea, one of the Current Protocols authors. "However, [...] there is the possibility that thousands of 21st century families could find themselves liberated from what should now be universally seen as 19th century causes of death and disease. This is an amazing prospect, and one in which a huge amount of human potential could be released. This is particularly mind-boggling when you think it might all come down to one incredibly useful tree."
The drought-resistant Moringa has been described as the “world’s most useful tree”, as it produces cooking and lighting oil, soil fertilizer, and highly-nutritious food in the form of its pods, leaves, seeds and flowers. It is grown in Africa, India, South East Asia and Central and South America - all places that lack sufficient potable water.
It has been known for some time that its seeds can also be used to purify water, although that knowledge has never been widely disseminated, even amongst the locals. The purification technique has recently been written up in the scientific journal Current Protocols in Microbiology, and is being offered as a free download as part of publisher John Wiley and Sons’ Corporate Citizenship Initiative. It is hoped that by offering the technique is this widely-available format, communities that need the information will be better able to get it.
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earthineer
Long Term Food Storage---Done Cheaply!
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Urban Chickens
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Kitchen Scraps and Food Storage
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A Simple Plan
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Why Not a Dairy Goat?
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Trash Can Root Cellar
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Baking Basic Bread
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How I learned about bokashi composting
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Mead Making: Techniques Old & New
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A Solution for the Gardener's Bane: WEEDS!
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Osceola
Osceola, also known as Billy Powell (1804 – January 30, 1838), became an influential leader with the Seminole in Florida. He was of Creek, Scots-Irish and English parentage, and had migrated to Florida with his mother after the defeat of the Creek in 1814.
Osceola led a small band of warriors in the Seminole resistance during the Second Seminole War, when the United States tried to remove the Seminoles from their lands. He exercised a great deal of influence on Micanopy, the highest-ranking chief of the Seminole.
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Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography/Osceola
OSCEOLA, or AS-SE-HE-HO-LAR (Black Drink), Seminole chief, b. on Chattahoochee river, Ga., in 1804; d. in Fort Moultrie, S. C., 30 Jan., 1838. He was the son of William Powell, an English trader with the Indians, and his mother was the daughter of a chief. In 1808 he removed with his mother to Florida, where he was early distinguished for ability, courage, and hatred of the whites, attained great influence among the Seminoles, and strongly opposed the cession of the tribal lands in Florida. In 1835, while on a visit to Fort King, his wife, the daughter of a fugitive slave, was stolen as a slave, and Osceola, in demanding her release of Gen. Thompson, the U. S. Indian agent, used threatening language. He was seized by order of the agent and put in irons, but was released after six days' imprisonment. Six months later, on 28 Dec., he avenged himself by killing Thompson and four others outside the fort, and thus began the second Seminole war. Osceola immediately took command of a band of Indians and fugitive slaves who on the same day had surprised and massacred Maj. Francis L. Dade and a detachment of 110 soldiers. On 31 Dec., with 200 followers, he encountered Gen. Duncan L. Clinch and 600 U. S. troops at the crossing of the Ouithlacoochee, and after a hard-fought action was compelled to retreat, having been wounded early in the battle. He afterward had several engagements with the troops under Gen. Edmund P. Gaines, and on 8 June, 1836, led a daring and well-conducted assault upon the fortified post at Micanopy, which was repelled with difficulty by the garrison of 300 regular troops. He made an unsuccessful attack on Fort Drane on 16 Aug. and narrowly escaped capture. For more than a year he contended with skill and energy against overwhelming odds; but on 21 Oct., 1837, while holding a conference under a flag of truce with Gen. Thomas S. Jesup near St. Augustine, he was seized with several of his followers and confined at Fort Moultrie, where he died. He was a brave and generous foe, and always protected women and children. Jesup asserted that his act was necessary, as Osceola had repeatedly shown that he would not regard the sanctity of a treaty.
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"Myths and Dreams: Exploring the Cultural Legacies of Florida and the Caribbean"
The year was 1804. It was an era of extreme volatility in the United States of America. One peculiar result of this turmoil was the assimilation of Africans, British, French and Americans into Native American communities. White men who, according to the government, preferred to "live the savage life," married Native American women and raised families. Many runaway slaves found asylum in Native American communities and intermarried. The people in the town of Tallassee, where Billy Powell, (later named Osceola) was born, were mixed-blood Native American/English/Irish/Scottish, and some were black. Billy was all of these. Non-Indians at first called them Seminolies. The word is thought to be derived from the Spanish word cimarrón, meaning "wild or runaway," and probably was used because of the maroons or runaway slaves who were living nearby and friendly with the Indians. Cimarrón became simalóni in the Creek language, which does not recognize the r sound. By 1765, they were referred to as "Seminole" in British documents.
Billy Powell’s chosen name, Osceola, was derived from the Indian term "Asiyahola," the cry given by those taking the ceremonial black drink that was supposed to cleanse the body and spirit. About 1813 Osceola’s father, an Englishman, separated from his mother and moved west. Osceola and his mother settled in several different Creek communities, first in northern, and later in central Florida. From this time through the 1830s, relations between Native Americans and Whites in Florida were rapidly deteriorating. White settlers illegally encroached on Native American lands. Native Americans in search of food, ammunition and liquor staged raids on whites. Escalating violence resulted in increasing support for the permanent removal of all Native Americans from Florida. Osceola, vehemently determined to remain in Florida, became the leader of the resistance. By the winter of 1835, reports concluded that he was leading a guerilla style army composed of about 250 followers.
Osceola maneuvered confidently between the White and Indigenous cultures. A persuasive orator, he was able to command authority within the Native American community and gain widespread notoriety throughout the United States. His statements were quoted and his movements narrated by an eager press. He used Native American culture as a lure to increase his following. In the ancient tradition, he staged ceremonial ballgames to promote cultural cohesion, and consolidate his leadership role. At the same time he secured ammunition and supplies from the game’s white military hosts.
History would surely have taken a different course had Osceola and the United States government not reached an irrevocable stalemate. During the battles of 1836-37 both sides used strategies that involved trickery and treachery, with the result that neither side could trust the other. Waving the white flag was rendered meaningless. The United States concluded that there was no alternative solution than to remove the Native Americans, either peaceably or by force. The Seminoles remained fiercely determined to remain in Florida.
As the fighting wore on through the summer of 1837 Osceola grew physically weak. He suffered from the effects of malaria contracted in 1836. By autumn soldiers destroyed most of the Native American’s towns and crops. Many of Osceola’s followers deserted and most of the allied Chiefs were killed, imprisoned or surrendered. On October 17, Osceola sent word to the United States government that he was ready to parley. He was arrested on October 27 under a white flag of truce and imprisoned at Fort Marion, St. Augustine.
On December 31, Osceola and his family were transferred to Fort Moultrie, South Carolina. Osceola would live only one more month, dying at the Fort. During that time he seems to have enjoyed the attentions of a curious public. Carolinians came to view him. Journalists chronicled his last days. Famous illustrators memorialized his image. "A great man of them – greater doubtless because his blood was half white, though his habits were all Indian, has fallen among them" (from the "Death of Osceola" New York Star, February 1838).
Osceola’s family would soon depart westward on a journey that ended with the resettlement of the Seminole people in western Oklahoma. Unlike the "Trail of Tears" that took place in a single, dreadful moment, in 1838, in which several thousand Cherokee people were sent on a death march to the West, the removals of the Seminole people from Florida began earlier and lasted 20 years longer. Just like that other event, however, the toll in human suffering was profound and the stain on the honor of a great nation, the United States, can never be erased. The Seminole people - men, women, and children, were hunted with bloodhounds, rounded up like cattle, and forced onto ships that carried them to New Orleans and up the Mississippi. Together with several hundred of the African ex-slaves who had fought with them, they were then sent overland to Fort Gibson (Arkansas), and on to strange and inhospitable new lands where they were attacked by other tribes, in a fierce competition for the scarce resources that they all needed to survive.
The Seminoles of Florida call themselves the "Unconquered People," descendants of just 300 Native Americans who managed to elude capture by the U.S. army in the 19th century. Today, more than 2,000 live on six reservations in the state – located in Hollywood, Big Cypress, Brighton, Immokalee, Ft. Pierce, and Tampa.
Links:
The Seminoles of Florida call themselves the "Unconquered People," descendants of just 300 Native Americans who managed to elude capture by the U.S. army in the 19th century. Today, more than 2,000 live on six reservations in the state – located in Hollywood, Big Cypress, Brighton, Immokalee, Ft. Pierce, and Tampa.
This site is dedicated to the rich history and culture of the Florida Seminole Tribe.
A short biography
For nearly twenty years, the Seminoles refused to live with and under the Muscogee Creek government, in 1856, a treaty was made with the Muscogee Creeks and the Federal government establishing the first Seminole Nation in Oklahoma. This nation, recognized as an independent nation within the United States and under its protection, consisted of the land between the South Canadian River and North Canadian River bounded on the East by a line where the present city of Tecumseh OK now exists, and on the west by the western boundary of the United States (in 1856), which was the 100th meridian.
In the early days of its existence, the fledgling United States government carried out a policy of displacement and extermination against the American Indians in the eastern US, systematically removing them from the path of "white" settlement.
In 1830 the Congress of the United States passed the "Indian Removal Act." Although many Americans were against the act, most notably Tennessee Congressman Davy Crockett, it passed anyway. President Jackson quickly signed the bill into law.
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Humanity Remembered
Are We Irradiated Mutants in a Techno-Spiritual Matrix?
By Zen Gardner
This might just explain the Fukushima spraydiation and other pending nuclear threats, airport scanners, HAARP and its affiliates, the massive abuse of medical and security scans, the EMF broadcast proliferation, GMOs, vaccines, chemtrails, fluoride and the rest.
They want us mutated. It’s pre-planned.
And they want just the right amount of dumbed-down handy fuel cells for an upgraded occult World Brain. I.e. “The Matrix”.
SciFi? I kid you not. We’ve suspected this all along and seen a lot of circumstantial evidence, but this is going to blow all that out of the water.
Born into the Matrix
The Very Real Plan for the Matrix
We know the matrix to some extent is definitely real. We’ve found that out by dot connecting massive amounts of information derived through years of research. Some is hidden in plain site as if they want us to get it and get used to it. Other information is so damning they don’t want it to come to light because it exposes with such clarity their arrogant, Illuminist agenda and the perfidy of their dark, controlling eugenic intentions.
This is just such information.
The endgame of a stifling one world group-think religion as predicted by many and forecast by the would-be Controllers is not going to come about by just declaring it. These guys worship science and technology of all sorts as the tools for bringing their Satanic agenda to life and have been busily using them for decades. And they know humanity needs to be “prepared and educated” as well as fearfully herded into the next phase of this agenda.
Hand in hand, Orwell and Huxley predicted technological domination and a pharmacologically altered new world over 60 years ago.
Close.
But not at all complete by any means. There is a lot more to their scientific world domination agenda, lots more.
[Continue reading from above link…]
From the MDJarv Channel
A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing
The Fabian Society, Communitarianism and the New World Order
This video is a very brief, six-minute introduction to the British Fabian Society, which was established on orders from the Crown in 1884, with the purpose of creating a movement to usher in by stealth a one world government.
The ideology promoted by Fabians and Fabian thinkers is called communitarianism, which is also sometimes referred to (by people like Tony Blair) as the 'Third Way'. The Third Way refers to the synthesis of capitalism and socialism in the dialectic scheme.
This dialectical synthesis, or outcome, is to be a collectivist form of government where all individualism is forcibly relinquished in the name of "unity" and complete and unwavering allegiance to the state under a scientific, socialistic dictatorship run by "experts."
This is to be a system run on complete and total efficiency, where the only purpose of the individual is to serve the state. The so-called "useless eaters," as people like Kissinger refer to, are seen as only a burden to this efficiency, and therefore will be incarcerated or killed if this system is allowed to be fully implemented. This is precisely why the "Elite" want an 80-90% reduction of the world's population, with just enough peasants to serve their utopia, described in writings by people such as Huxley and Fabian H.G. Wells, and promoted still today in well-funded works of propaganda such as Zeitgeist, which are designed to promote the New World Order religion.
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“The Nephilim are major players in the Old Testament. They were the giants of old.”
— John Kaminski
Lakasha Darkmoon
Shadow of the Comet, by John Kaminski
John Kaminski is a writer who lives on the Gulf Coast of Florida, constantly trying to figure out why we are destroying ourselves, and pinpointing a corrupt belief system as the engine of our demise. Solely dependent on contributions from readers, please support his work by mail: 250 N. McCall Rd. #2, Englewood FL 34223 USA. http://johnkaminski.info/
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THE REAL HISTORY:
How the Bad Time came
Glimpse of the world before The Flood
Those who fight with arms are not men of counsel,
therefore no king must bear arms.
His wisdom must be his weapon,
and the love of his warriors his shield.
By John Kaminski
In the minds of people who don't say things because they're politically correct but actually believe what they say, the notion that mainstream history is either genuine or accurate was vaporized long ago. (Voltaire: "History is fables agreed upon." Churchill: "History is written by the victors.")
Right now humanity is speeding toward the destruction of everything it has ever built, and likely only the robots it will build will survive the multiple catastrophes now blossoming toward apocalyptic fruition. Indeed, robots may be the sixth root race spoken of in the spiritual legends.
For all practical purposes, the real history of our present version of the human species begins on a single day around 3100 BC, which is not so coincidentally the beginning of both the Mayan calendar — now popular because it ends later this year, 2012 — and also the day in Hindu folklore when Krishna left the planet.
That was the day when either a comet or recurring fragments of what is now known as the Taurid meteor shower devastated our planet in a way that has been seldom seen since, but left a permanent echo of fear in our genetic and intellectual heritage.1
Surviving refugees fled all over the world, and brought their pre-flood culture with them. This is how civilizations began, by refugees from catastrophes who spread superior technology around the world. The clearest picture of this fateful moment in time is in the Norse legends, redacted through Iceland.
EDDA
An Eyewitness Account of Gotterdammerung (Sorensen: Ragnarok)
"Everything is shaking and quaking . . . The wolf is so big that it can snap from earth to heaven, enabling it to swallow the Sun.
The snake is so big, that it fills the sea, runs into the beach and throws fire and poison so that the earth begins to catch fire.
Heimdall blows into his horn, more loudly than a thunderstorm, the soldiers of Valhalla are crowding on the lowland of Ida, but giant birds and dragons spitting fire fill the air and fall on the lowland and fall on the soldiers crushing them.
Thor slings his hammer towards the wolf and smashes its head, its poison bursts out and Thor stumbles and falls.
The ash has burned into smoke . . . the sea swells over the Middle Land, the giant birds fly with their wings in fire, and then vanish as sparks in the smoke."2
This is what happened to Planet Earth in the late 4th millennium BC, and other calamitous geophysical events continued throughout much of the third. This is why our glimpses of ancient civilizations are truncated — first they're there, and then, poof, they're gone, only to be later rebuilt by different people.
The brilliant civilization of Sargon's Akkad, the Hittites, the Egyptians, and even the Chinese were all obliterated c. 2200 BC by some worldwide celestial catastrophe, according to the chemical composition of anomalous strata analyzed by archeologists.
It is well known by now that the apocalyptic visions of the Old Testament were triggered by memories of the Thera volcano which decimated the eastern Mediterranean world c. 1300 BC.
Other fields of study reveal that following these celestial or tectonic catastrophes is always at least a century of silence and darkness; in the case of the Dark Age of Ancient Greece, perhaps up to four hundred years.
More importantly, the survivors of these catastrophes migrated and brought their abilities with them. It has been the way of the world since time began.
One example: A thousand years AFTER these catastrophes, a voyager from Phoenicia named Pacal Votan fled the tyranny imposed by Alexander the Great and sailed, first to Florida, but then to the Yucatan, where he taught the natives how to build monuments based on Egyptian principles, as much earlier refugees from disaster had taught the Peruvians.3
Glimpse of the world before The Flood
In the villages of southeast China, legends tell of an ancient “Golden Age” before the days of armies, warlords or dynasties. Archaeologists describe the cultures of neolithic China (ca 6,000–2500 BCE) as “matriarchal societies.” Inside neat rows of houses, "Goddess figurines" presided over fireplaces.
Unlike in Old Europe, weapons of war or defensive walls were not found in the archeological strata. In pre-dynastic writings, clans are headed by women. The pre-historic “emperors of perfect virtue” bore their mother’s family names.
Sometime around 2000 BC China turned into a patriarchal society, archeologically symbolized by blades in the hands of male warriors. Some historians claim this shift happened naturally, without major invasions of warlike nomads that plagued early Western civilization.
But some series of events turned China’s reigning ideals almost upside down between the “matrilineal” Yangshao culture of 5000-3500 BCE, and the rise of the first imperial warlords.4
The term Golden Age (Χρυσόν Γένος) comes from Greek mythology and legend and refers to the first in a sequence of four or five (or more) Ages of Man, in which the Golden Age is first, followed in sequence, by the Silver, Bronze, and Iron Ages, and then the present, a period of decline. By extension "Golden Age" denotes a period of primordial peace, harmony, stability, and prosperity.
Similar concepts dominate the religious and philosophical traditions of the South Asian subcontinent. For example, the Vedic or ancient Hindu culture saw history as cyclical, composed of yugas with alternating Dark and Golden Ages. The Kali yuga (Iron Age), Dwapara (Bronze Age), Treta yuga (Silver Age) and Satya yuga (Golden Age) correspond to the four Greek ages.
In classical mythology the Golden Age was presided over by the deity Astraea, who was identified with Justice. She lived with men until the end of the Silver Age, but in the Brazen Age, when men became violent and greedy, fled to the stars, where she appears as the constellation Virgo, holding the scales of Justice, or Libra.
Reading the myths properly you can see how she was metaphorically purged from the Earth and consigned to the distant stars in a male cosmology. In other words, made to disappear.
European Pastoral literary and iconographic tradition often depicted nymphs and shepherds as living a life of rustic innocence and simplicity, untainted by the corruptions of civilization — a continuation of the Golden Age — set in an idealized Arcadia, a region of Greece that was the abode and center of worship of the goat-footed Pan, who dwelt among them.5
This idea was ridiculed as impossible fantasy when men took control of societies.
It is my contention that the celestial catastrophe(s) that destroyed various prehistoric civilizations (including the Hittites and Troy) earned the victims of these disasters the blame for their happening.
Hence, Satan, which was one name of the deity belonging to giant white prehistoric seafarers who established slave colonies all over the world, was eventually and justifiably cast as the devil. At one time — it seems certain from the classical sources, including the Bible — these same seafarers typically ate some of those they conquered. Certainly they mated with them, and generated all manner of bizarre half breeds.
So you can see how they got such a bad reputation.
This tradition particularly pertains to the ancient Hebrews in Jerusalem, as well as the Phoenicians, who were the kings of the sea descended from these same vastly superior white giant cannibals.
It is on these bizarre and suppressed origins that all the oral traditions of organized religions — most especially including circumcision — are based.
Circumcision plays a central role in this regard for another reason, in that it somehow demarcates the historical transition from matrilineal to patrilineal societies, that point in time when fear and force overcame duty and necessity. Perhaps this barbaric mutilation of the human body became a universal signature in cultures which aimed to never let women rule again.
But the point is, the victims of cultures destroyed by comets and meteors in the 3rd and 2nd millennia BC were blamed for their own misfortune, and the culture of the queen mother who assured peace reigned supreme was obliterated by natural disasters and the bloodthirsty swords of male insecurity.
The many celestial disasters that affected the Earth over thousands of years were later codified into patriarchal religions, with anthropomorphic personalities ascribed to the celestial events that had been witnessed. When naked Celtic warriors overran Rome in 118 BC, their fearlessness knew only one limitation: they feared nothing except that the sky would fall on them.
Subsequent historians have ridiculed such a quaint aboriginal notion without realizing its reference to the most significant geophysical events that ever happened to the world, catastrophes that triggered both the growth of new civilizations and the expansion of human intellect in seeking solutions about how to escape this periodic death from above.
Back in the 1980s, the work of Marija Gimbutas6 and others first popularized the notion of matrilineal society. Backed up by thousands of archeological icons unearthed in the last two hundred years and dated to as early as 35,000 years ago, savage men venerated the menstrual cycle's connection to the moon and the essential magic of life between the legs of the goddess, and because of this, communities cohered around the strongest mother.
There is of course no written narrative of life in those times. But like the Norse myths that recapture the ancient life through the Icelandic legends written thousands of years later, there is one enigmatic book that purports to tell of life before the flood.
In 1876, a man named William R. Sandbach produced an oddity titled The Oera Linda Book, allegedly a translation from a language called Old Frisian (now a region of The Netherlands) of a book written in AD 1256, and supposedly including writings from the 9th century AD.7
Officialdom ruled the book a forgery based on the paper on which it was written and also the parts of the translation that evinced a too-modern vocabulary.
The Oera Linda book claims to be a chronicle of wars and migrations of the Frisian people. It describes events dated very precisely from 2194 BCE to 803 CE. The reference date is the submergence of 'Atland,' a lost land in the North Sea, which, according to the book, occurred in 2193 BCE. The book is peppered with descriptions of catastrophic earth changes, including volcanic eruptions, strange weather, and rapid sea level changes. This is intriguing because, even if a forgery, the Oera Linda Book predates the origin of the modern Atlantis craze, which began with Ignatius Donnelly's Atlantis, the Antediluvian World, published in 1882.8
Though supposedly based on Frisian texts from the 9th and 13th centuries AD, the scope of the later writing in the text reveals a knowledge and a use of language far beyond what was known in the world at those times, perhaps revealing a more modern hand crafting the supposedly ancient Frisian text.
Nevertheless, for whatever reason, Oera Linda contains a vivid depiction of what life in a matriarchal society might have been like. The whole text: http://www.sacred-texts.com/atl/olb/olb07.htm
Here are just a few of what I thought were the most admirable practices:
The kings of Frieselend could do nothing without the approval of the mother, who administered a hierarchy of virgin priestesses, whose rule was unchallenged law.
At the election of the defenders no burgher . . . or other person of distinction, shall vote, but only the people.
Just imagine . . . and real people counting the votes, too, instead of Jewish corporations.
Those who fight with arms are not men of counsel, therefore no king must bear arms. His wisdom must be his weapon, and the love of his warriors his shield.
If you could actually name the most recent world leader who had these qualities, I'd be very surprised. I think you have to go back to ancient China.
If the king wishes to do anything which his council opposes, he may not persist in it.
Today, no leader dares ignore the puppetmasters who put them in office.
Under all circumstances the mother must take care that her children, that is, Frya's people, shall remain as temperate as possible. This is her most important duty, and it is the duty of all of us to help her in performing it.
If any of them should seek a daughter of yours to wife, and she is willing, explain to her her folly; but if she will follow her lover, let her go in peace.
If a maiden wishes to marry, she must announce it to the mother, and immediately resign her office, before her passion shall have polluted the light.
From the writings of the prehistoric philosopher Minno:
"Eva" means that sentiment which is implanted in the breast of every man in order that he may know what is right and what is wrong, and by which he is able to judge his own deeds and those of others; that is, if he has been well and properly brought up.
"Eva" has also another meaning; that is, tranquil, smooth, like water that is not stirred by a breath of wind. If the water is disturbed it becomes troubled, uneven, but it always has a tendency to return to its tranquil condition. That is its nature, just as the inclination towards justice and freedom exists in Frya's children.
Eternal and unalterable are the signs wisdom and rectitude, which must be sought after by all pious people, and must be possessed by all judges. If, therefore, it is desired to make laws and regulations which shall be permanent, they must be equal for all men. The judges must pronounce their decisions according to these laws.
If any crime is committed respecting which no law has been made, a general assembly of the people shall be called, where judgment shall be pronounced in accordance with the inspiration of God's spirit. If we act thus, our judgment will never fail to be right.
If instead of doing right, men will commit wrong, there will arise quarrels and differences among people and states. Thence arise civil wars, and everything is thrown into confusion and destroyed; and, O foolish people! while you are injuring each other the spiteful other people with their false priests come and attack your ports, ravish your daughters, corrupt your morals, and at last throw the bonds of slavery over every freeman's neck.
Could there be a more pertinent parallel to today's events?
The priests asked Hellenia, the mother, "Where, then does evil come from?" She responded as Thomas Jefferson responded thousands of years later, and threw it in the face of the priests:
All the evil comes from you, and from the stupidity of the people who let themselves be deceived by you, (which) reminds me that there are people on earth who have their homes in churches and holes, who go about in the twilight, not to deliver us from mice and other plagues, but to invent tricks to steal away the knowledge of other people, in order to take advantage of them, to make slaves of them, and to suck their blood like leeches.
Hello USA today!
How the Bad Time came
During the whole summer the sun had been hid behind the clouds, as if unwilling to look upon the earth. There was perpetual calm, and the damp mist hung like a wet sail over the houses and the marshes. The air was heavy and oppressive, and in men's hearts was neither joy nor cheerfulness.
In the midst of this stillness the earth began to tremble as if she was dying. The mountains opened to vomit forth fire and flames. Some sank into the bosom of the earth, and in other places mountains rose out of the plain.
Aldland, called by the seafaring people, Atland, disappeared, and the wild waves rose so high over hill and dale that everything was buried in the sea. Many people were swallowed up by the earth, and others who had escaped the fire perished in the water.
Whole forests were burned one after the other, and when the wind blew from that quarter our land was covered with ashes. Rivers changed their course, and at their mouths new islands were formed of sand and drift.
During three years this continued, but at length it ceased, and forests became visible. Many countries were submerged, and in other places land rose above the sea, and the wood was destroyed through the half of Twiskland (Germany). Other people came and settled in the empty places. Our dispersed people were exterminated or made slaves. Then watchfulness was doubly impressed upon us, and time taught us that union is force.
The Oera Linda story confirms many of the prehistoric assertions that civilization was brought to the Mediterranean by refugees from the North Atlantic region where the main part of the comet hit.
When Min-erva had examined the country which is called by the inhabitants Attica, she saw that the people were all goatherds, and that they lived on meat, wild roots, herbs, and honey. They were clothed in skins, and had their dwellings on the slopes (hellinga) of the hills, wherefore they were called Hellingers.
At first they ran away, but when they found that we dare not attack them, they came back and showed great friendship. Min-erva asked if we might settle there peaceably. This was agreed to on the condition that we should help them to fight against their neighbours, who came continually to carry away their children and to rob their dwellings.
Then we built a citadel at an hour's distance from the harbour. By the advice of Min-erva it was called Athens, because, she said, those who come after us ought to know that we are not here by cunning or violence, but were received as friends (âtha). While we were building the citadel the principal personages came to see us, and when they saw that we had no slaves it did not please them, and they gave her to understand it, as they thought that she was a princess.
But Min-erva said, How did you get your slaves? They answered, We bought some and took others in war.
Min-erva replied, If nobody would buy slaves they would not steal your children, and you would have no wars about it. If you wish to remain our allies, you will free your slaves. The chiefs did not like this, and wanted to drive us away; but the most enlightened of the people came and helped us to build our citadel, which was built of stone.
What we accept as certainty is really only a myth, and because of that we fail to see its real meaning.
Patriarchy is an unjustified aberration in human behavior that came about when the matriarchy was unfairly blamed for the comet catastrophes that wracked the planet in the third millennium BC. This shift poisoned the Earth's human social order for all the days to come.
Patriarchy has no answer for the deteriorating condition of the world; matriarchy does. It should be obvious. In the words of the supreme mother in a land forgotten by time, her words ring out clearly . . .
You have seen how speedily I have come to your assistance.
Do likewise to your neighbour, but wait not for his entreaties.
The suffering would curse you,
my maidens would erase your name from the book,
and I would regard you as a stranger.
If ever it should happen that one of your people
should sell his freedom, he is not of you, he is a bastard.
I counsel you to expel him and his mother from the land.
Repeat this to your children morning, noon, and night,
till they think of it in their dreams.
John Kaminski is a writer who lives on the Gulf Coast of Florida, constantly trying to figure out why we are destroying ourselves, and pinpointing a corrupt belief system as the engine of our demise. Solely dependent on contributions from readers, please support his work by mail: 250 N. McCall Rd. #2, Englewood FL 34223 USA. http://johnkaminski.info/ (site inactive)
Footnotes:
1. The 3rd Millennium BC . . . http://personal.eunet.fi/pp/tilmari/tilmari2.htm#first
3. Votan: Colonizer of the Americas http://solomonspalding.com/SRP/saga2/VotanLDS.htm
6. Marija Gimbutas http://pacifica.edu/innercontent-m.aspx?id=1762
7. Oera Linda http://www.sacred-texts.com/atl/olb/olb07.htm
<|>
About that God you bought
Religion is the delusional psychosis of death denial
The greatest con of all time was getting the world to believe
in different versions of the same god. It guaranteed eternal war.
By John Kaminski
They were savages. We had a right to kill them. They were only Indians.
This was how righteous white Europeans colonized North America, best illustrated by General Sherman's genocide of the Plains Indians or Andrew Jackson's decision to remove the Seminoles from Florida and the Cherokees from North Carolina in which four fifths of the conquered peoples died.
The whole culture of innocent natives who, most important of all, respected their environment because it fed them, was wiped out by an abstraction, a delusional psychosis of superiority based upon the conceit of superior weapons and the suppression of genuine conscience.
This so-called industrial revolution was guided by the foul tyranny of those who claimed the power of an abstract and ruthless God, an entity who supposedly controlled everything but remained utterly alien to the truly religious natives who were murdered for it.
If you ever want an accurate description of Christians, ask an American Indian. Christians ask you for help, then kill you when you give it to them. Many people in the world today think that is actually the working definition of an American.
Israelis use the same violent rationale as the Jewish international bankers to plunder the world with their debt tricks and clever scams that suck the life out of every living thing — all based on the theory that it's OK to kill human savages.
Officials of all the monotheistic religions enthusiastically endorse this position: Muslims issue fatwahs against those who profane the name of the prophet (pbuh!), Christians use the great Old Testament schism of Ham and Shem to make war on blacks, and Jews cover both angles by wanting to kill or enslave all the non Jews of the world.
The embarrassing irony of it all, and the shameful irony of every effort America has made in the world, is that whites never would have made it in America at all were it not for the initial kindness of the natives who saved the early Pilgrims from starving and taught them how to farm.
The reward the Indians received for their friendship was death from every angle.
The utter eradication of a healthy culture — the natives — by an unhealthy culture — ours.
The white abstraction that removed the Indians from paradise and imprisoned the few that survived on impoverished reservations is exactly what America, run by the weapons makers from behind the scenes as they have done throughout history, is now doing to the world.
On our current path, the whole world is scheduled to live on a reservation where people have no say as to what happens to them. What you see happening to the unfortunate natives of Afghanistan and Iraq is now happening in the continental U.S., the predictable outcome of the Israeli formula to turn the whole world into a walled-in Palestine, which is surely a prelude to scheduled extermination.
This is your reward for trying to be a patriotic member of the herd that is totally based on created abstractions that replace the natural order of things with voodoo profitmaking strategies which take no account of the number of people being killed.
What is the dogma, what is the belief system, that condones this? More than condones, commands the murder of others to achieve dogmatic dominance, to enforce one's version of reality in the minds of others. For what purpose is this done?
St. Augustine famously insisted, "That which is known as the Christian religion existed among the ancients, and never did not exist; from the beginning of the human race until the time when Christ came in the flesh, at which time the true religion, which already existed began to be called Christianity. (Retract. I, xiii, cited by Dr. Alvin Boyd Kuhn in his Shadow of The Third Century, Elizabeth N.J.: Academy Press, 1949, p.3).
Augustine is not alone in his testimony.
Eusebius, the great champion of Christianity, admits in his book: "that which is called the Christian religion is neither new nor strange, but — if it be lawful to testify the truth — was known to the ancients" (Hist. Eccl. lib. 2, ch. v.).
So what comes down to us today from these ancient holy men are very similar systems with minor cosmetic differences all recommending that the enemies of their dogma be exterminated, and that is world history, coordinated always by the men controlling the money from the oldest times. And always the same profit strategy: arrange perpetual wars.
Everyone in the world wants to be embedded in the social order of their choice, so they embrace what they have, and lie to convince themselves that the people who had to be killed were obviously evil, even though the facile rationales for their deaths — like 'they hate our freedoms' — are nothing but cover stories for theft, exploitation and mass murder.
Upon this is our so-called American pride based.
Our individual hopes of eternal safety, upon which the whole world bases its activity, are based on the same kind of flimsy, manipulated dogma, and revealed as phony by the bloodthirsty tone of the words its God purportedly speaks. To a mature mind, what else can it be other than Wizard of Oz priests pretending to be the Almighty himself?
Yet the majority of the world clings to these false hopes, and insist they are God's honest truth right down till your last breath, termination of which is provided by them because you wouldn't believe what they told you to believe.
And what is their message? What is the highest Christian aspiration?
To be abused all your life by powers the Bible says YOU SHOULD NOT oppose, and then be crucified for your troubles. Above the Bible says NOT TO DISOBEY the 'rightful authorities'. The same folks who choose authorities that are 'rightful' and the same folks who brought you the thought that if you just believe that rising-from-the-tomb story, you will forever be OK.
This is the greatest Jewish scam ever, locking up the minds of millions of people with an impossible idea that absolutely everyone wants to hear. For all his evil intent, Marx was right to call it a drug. (He just neglected to mention who invented it.)
This is demonstrably delusional behavior, locking up the minds of the faithful to better be able to deploy them as an armed force to defend the bogus ideas.
This is exactly the reason why everything is upside down — war is peace, and love is politically incorrect.
For many thousands of years, humans killed each on the basis of these regional lies — but they were all operating on the same xenophobic principle — the other is evil because he doesn't speak like me.
The karmic residue of this bad path is now manifesting in reality, causing our premature deaths.
Only recognition of it and implementation of a saner and unmanipulated way of adjusting to the limitations of our lives can save our species from total extinction, as the powers that be turns us into robots who can no longer think at all.