Exhibiting Appropriate Grief

This long, dark, new moony night, let us howl at the obscured moon. Let us howl so deeply into the darkness that the void becomes full. Let us grieve the loss of so many loved ones and those who created the culture which we inherited. Without their efforts, we would be decidedly worse off. We must mourn in kind for the many beautiful people who have left this plane of existence, whose hand now guides us through our memories of them. Let our actions be informed by our wish to keep the memory of our heroes alive. Let us howl, sob or cry out once again for those who have passed the veil, not just those we lost this week or month, but the month before that, beyond time, down through all the ages. Take the time to actually do it. Blubber if you feel that giving voice to your deepest hurts. Let the grief guide your cries, let them echo amongst the hills and trees and run up the ravines and down through glades left unexplored. Howl and name those who have gone, Hail! them, all! We must release the grief associated with the thousands of swimming pools full of oil that have been washed into now-dead ecosystems, places we get our water.

We need to adequately grieve and release the inter-generational hurt associated with being sold a bill of goods, mostly by greedy white rich guys for at least the last ten centuries. If examples of the failures and short-comings of "civilizations" do not come quickly to mind, let us review...backing up through history, we have come through (although not all the way yet), the housing bubble. This year marked the first time homes in the United States of America, on average, were worth as much as they were ten years ago. This freakish and seeming impossibility was accompanied by great fanfare and patting one another on the back by rich white guys, but the fact that we lost the value that homes had always held in the past. They used to help offset the effects of inflation because they increased in value over time. so really, ten years of accrued value in our homes have been stolen by these same rich white guys. Now, we are supposed to forgive them? Because we are "even"? Just go back, through the dot com bubble bursting, the savings and loan crisis, the redlining of cities across our nation...which, in part, led to the 73-75 recession, when all the people who fled the cities were driving back and forth to jobs that had become much further away, perfectly setting us up for the "energy crisis" that boomed and busted the oil economy over a very short period of time. Billions were fleeced from the American Public and the vast majority of our citizens took it on the chin. This is when our manufacturing sector began to be undermined by foreign offshoring, although it would not be called that for over a decade. The cities, once they had their value stolen, effectively pushed the middle class out of our central cities. The 1953 recession before that was caused by post-war inflation, again, a picking of the pockets of those least able to defend themselves in the marketplace.
We can go back to the most legendary depression, in '29. Unequal distribution of wealth and power figure directly into that rough patch. On and on throughout history, we have an economic history chock full of blatant theft of wealth from the poorest and most marginalized people for the enrichment of oligarchs. Grieving thousands of years of being taken advantage of may take time, but please, abandon yourself as fully as possible, we will need you healed to take this to the next level.

I feel that if we can appropriately feel the experience of and release of the grief which our species has had to endure; we can use the energy as a motivational tool to give impetus toward attaining the prize, which folk and gospel songs taught us to keep our eyes on. The prize that we often are reminded of during Black History Month, where each of us will be judged by the content of our character, not the color of our skin and/or whether or not you have a dick swinging between your legs. Our species has had to deal with so many atrocities, I believe, we have not adequately mourned. They killed Abraham Lincoln, JFK; they shot MLK, they shot Bobby, Leonard Peltier and the members of MOVE who are still imprisoned, countless others and innocents who stood for nothing but wanting to have a chance, have been gunned down through the ages and we have not mourned appropriately. Instead of wallowing in the self-pity and grief, we need to release it. I want to give reason for our exquisite pain as a species from all injustices to ultimately quicken our souls to action.

With love, we will transform the planet.

It may have been enough to keep our eyes on the prize generations ago, but today, we need to convert this hurt into action. The prize can only be attained by honoring the fact that we are all stardust, by realizing that "War is not healthy for children or other living things." We need to honor the fact that virtually everything the hippies were saying back in the day is being proved to be correct by science. We need to come to terms with, understand and be willing to act to solve the myriad problems associated with human greed, lust for money and the deceitful exploitation of others, for money. After the "Dust Bowl", during which over a billion tons of topsoil were blown away, millions of lives were impacted, we failed to talk about the subsidy that whole process represented in our "agricultural industrialization, we let the cost fall inordinately to the poorest farmers and citizens. We, the people did nothing to build back the lost soils, we were just trying to stay alive. We can mourn forever, but it will not build a single teaspoon of soil. Part of not being nourished, as humans, is to face physiologic challenges, additional stressors and constant low-grade anger within your very cells, who are being deprived of the resources they need to function optimally. Just like when we get depressed or internalize this grief (instead of letting it out) it deprives us of our vigor which has effects much like depletion of minerals and lack of a healthy array of healthy plants in our diets. Just like adrenaline, no matter how good you feel while "on" it, the metabolites are toxic as heck and the withdrawal can be crushing. Getting our grief out really brings these issues into the open. We pretty much all agree on things that need to be done. All we need to do is take back our power, stop allowing the oligarchs to buy elections and let the grandmothers (and womyn generally) help us to transform our culture into a more humanitarian one.

I woke up this morning crying at the ruthless focus we have put on the next quarter, as well as the power it wields in guiding the arc of capitalism. There is no way to invest in the next seven generations if you are only willing to look three months into the future. Change is gonna come, we (our generation) has to be the stimulus for that change. We must not let our grief consume us, nor should we hold in our pain. Shoving these issues down, deeper into our cultural reality/matrix, instead of exalting them to inspire the change we wish to see in the world would be sub-human. Wail, scream, allow yourself to become a blathering pool of sobbing on the floor if it brings you cleansing. Let it all hang out. Those who love, honor and respect you will be here to coax you back to the fully functioning human we will all need to be to bring the gift of life to future generations. You, reader, are loved and there are those you may never meet in person who wish you only the best in your journey. If I could be there, in person-to hold you and validate your pain, I would. I may not be able to fix the problems and abuses myself, but I'm willing to stand with you in an age in which the oligarchs just want you to acquiesce, I am willing to do what I can to help usher in an age of enlightenment in an environment of fear and hate.

Open Letter to the Vast Middle

I alluded to this a couple posts ago, fundamentally we are already in crisis. I continue to make the point that it is a crisis of spirit. A balance point (some call it "sustainability") lies somewhere far off and seemingly, for some, unattainable. I believe that it is so close it would bite us if we just observed reality and acted accordingly. Basic physics says that eventually we will hit some mass (or truth, ie: playing out of oil reserves, you know, that part of the boom and bust cycle.) large enough to stop our trajectory. Rather than focusing on gloom and doom scenaria (yes, spellcheck, that is how you pluralize a Latin-derived word.) I want to bring soul-lutions to any problem I can find. There are a plethora. On a happier note, each tiny step toward that balance affects many other aspects of our lives and the lives of others as well.I think Seal says it best, "If we're ever gonna survive, we're all gonna' have to get a little crazy!"

 THE SWORD

 This game of perception, that is where we seem to be most handicapped. Many say, "Seeing is believing." Some say that the things we can see and hold in our hands contain our only truth, like the daily news reports. Using that mind set, we will never admit or see that when we berate someone or make them feel less, that it affects the whole tribe. Those collateral damages will almost certainly happen beyond our limited view or "reality". Each ripple we make in society has lasting effects, whether we know it or not. Valuing things we cannot see, on the other hand can affirm life, long after our actions have been taken. Quick example: over ten years ago I invested my entire life savings into a car that more than doubled my fuel efficiency. Over the last ten years, the car has purchased itself in gas savings. I invested for ten years of "free car", by paying for it all at once, up front. The revolutionary thing now is that when we invest in solar, wind or other renewable energy source, we are essentially per purchasing energy, which, by the way, can only go up in price. What we "see" in our highly mediated world these days bears little or no resemblance to reality, not in any way! You will never see a commercial encouraging you to pre-pay your electric bill for a decade to reduce global warming, because the people who have seen the writing on the wall are investing and occasionally being penalized for it. It is more likely that you will see a commercial telling you that your local provider of electricity are doing their best for you. Because their future depends on you not buying electricity in advance, from a sustainable system. We need to learn to tailor our perception accordingly, like wearing rain gear in bad weather, we need to be protected from false reports, because all images coming into our perceptual apparatus are suspect. They have been tailored to create what we think we know. A good start is understanding that what we see in advertising is almost always the result of deceit, if not it is at least complicit in our brainwashing. I always ask myself, "How much money do you have to make to be able to afford to spend this kind of money?" and then I think, "I would rather hear from a trusted friend that what they have there is worth what you pay." This trumping up of need where there is none presents such a clear and present danger that we need to re-think the whole premise while wearing something like a mind condom.

         THE CHALICE

The bell curve, as many have learned is as much about probability (statistics) as it is about perception. Now, from penises to vaginas First imagine the spreading "legs" of the diagram. Remember, the region that is rendered as negative space holds as much information as what is in the foreground, sometimes more.To large extent, "we" are who we believe ourselves to be and along even that spectrum there is a bell-shaped distribution of how correct we are in the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves. In fact, we are constantly "giving birth" to ourselves. Most of us (80%) get it pretty "right" that's the way bell curves work. The shadow side is that there is a distribution in the way we think of ourselves, in the negative realm, the things we call our failings. There is a bell shaped curve involved there as well. Most of us get it pretty right but there are outliers, twenty percent by definition. I think we all have an idea of what the average American looks like and perhaps we are on target with that assessment as well and again, we're probably about 80% right. The question left hanging is how do we bring into being the "better angels of our nature" as Abraham Lincoln called them, our humanity, our compassionate Buddha, how do we let "God's will" or whatever you prefer to call it, flow through our actions? Bear in mind, we are the midwives attending the birth of the next generation. always keep in mind, what they will need to know.

This Week

Marks the end of a continuum. Which is an impossibility.  The year 2016 has not been particularly horrible, vicious, hostile or dangerous. In retrospect, the plague years were probably quite a bit worse, but hey, we lack imagination and perspective so hey, get on your woe is me boots and cinch up your get on the bandwagon saddle because every year, from now on will be more of a wild ride than you can imagine.  With the advent of so many dancers, models and artists of all types making names for themselves, there will continue to be famous people dying in record numbers for at least the foreseeable future. With any number that rises, there will be more of the things that result from those things happening. I was in a very small group of people when I was young. I had over three hundred musical artists represented in my personal collection of music. It took me years to grow a collection like that back then and there may have been another thousand or so artists whose music I had heard but not gotten my own album, yet.  Now, I could have ten times that many artists on my phone, in my pocket!  There will, perhaps always be more famous people dying and we need to get significantly more clear on what that means and what is the nature of appropriate grief.

I want to guide discussion away from how terrible it is that so many personalities we are losing, but perhaps more importantly, why didn't we listen to them more while they were alive. The generation that we are losing, for the most part are those who were hip, turned on, tuned in and if not for the fame were mostly dropped out. The generation who believed fervently in peace and love, an ecologically benign path to a sustainable future even before that term was coined. Thirty, or fifty years ago they were formed in the crucible of "The Pill", ERA, human rights struggle and the social unrest that exemplify our time. Rich against poor, urban vs.rural, hip vs. square, educated WASPS against the rest of us, etc. Any and every possible faction was cleaved from WE the People, who were the vast numbers who remain, to this day disenfranchised by their lack of interest in politics, brought on by the false propaganda of our age.

Although, technically this photo is not from this week, it shows the demolition of a historic building in downtown Green Bay. Because no one can afford to start new businesses, this sat empty for nearly twenty years and finally went to the landfill simply because it became inconvenient.  

They say we are disconnected, but I campaigned for U.S. House of Representatives for nearly a year  and found that the vast majority of us are more alike than we are different. Let me start at a relatively straightforward spot and say, we all have heard that anti-war protesters hate military personnel. The ultimate rehash of this is always the Vietnam War veteran, who upon returning, was spat on by a young hippy. I am not interested in outliers. This may have happened dozens of times, however 540,000 troops came back and only an infinitesimally small percentage of them were ever spat upon by hippies. I have spoken with thousands of veterans and ordinary citizens alike who detest what the military is doing, but do not blame the enlisted men and women of our armed forces one bit for bad policies dreamed up by Congress and/or our Commander in Chief. My point is that the vast majority support our troops and less so their mission, but every person that talked about military "honor" and respect, were turned off by the fact that every performer who does a show seems to have the obligatory support our troops moment, or song, or tribute. This is absolutely not to say that people do not honor and respect military personnel ,quite the opposite. The many, many folks that I have spoken with agree, it is as if the commercialization of patriotism is on sale in these events. When there are fly-overs at the start of football games, it is just advertising for war, plain and simple. Nothing to do with honor and respect. In fact, the majority of vets who I spoke with about these pairings of tribute with concerts and sporting events did not want to be reminded of the horrors of war and especially having it brought to their attention at an entertainment venue. It is slanderous not to represent, or respect the feelings of the very people you claim to pay tribute to! Perhaps a better way to heap your praise on them is to discount their tickets quietly and limit the beating of war drums to others.

It is not anti-veteran to be pro-peace. In fact even the term anti-war is suspect because virtually everyone I have talked to about the issues of peace and war are overwhelmingly for peace, only when they are pushed do they retreat to the anti-war posture. This is another area where the people need to lead, so that the leaders will eventually follow. Just like the term "pro-abortion" was coined. I have talked to thousands of folks about this issue during the course of my life and not one was pro-anything about-abortion. Rape and incest, reasons for having an abortion they were against, but they were pro-basic human dignity, not pro abortion. They were pro-equal pay for equal work pro-education and pro-family, because conditions of poverty, ignorance and irresponsibility created inhospitable lives for potential mothers. The people I speak with routinely still believe that having to be born into poverty, with no access to nutritious food, education, health care or opportunity is worse than not being born at all. I place no value on this, I am only running to represent the truth that the American people are dealing with. Of course, we are all in agreement that every life is sacred, but that is the reason some choose the terrible course of making the choice they feel is necessary.

At this point we are being assaulted with fake news that claims "Half of Trump's supporters"...half of 24% is 12%, who really cares about that many folks anyway? Our media circus has expanded to beyond three rings! Now six cartels control what we think is news. Get ready to be told many, many more lies before the truth comes out.

When we begin to have a Congress that looks like the American People, we will see change, not before then. As long as the vast majority of our representatives are millionaires, they will always side with money and power over the general good of our nation. The ultrawealthy have been winning the class war for over fifty years. Expecting oligarchs to be less harsh in the future, or expecting them to stop pandering to our basest instincts to get us to ignore the truth with them, is just a hopeful fantasy. We will continue to hear about heroes who are passing because it aids in keeping us paralyzed, out of politics and unaware of real events taking place simultaneously in the other rings. As with every "year", we bather ourselves with the names of those who have passed and regret things a little more deeply, because that is what the media giants tell us we do.

When people I care about pass the veil, I get fired up, I get emotional and I get even more anxious to get these things accomplished. The only decent memorial I would want would be to finally attain world peace, human rights, affirm every person's dignity and to eliminate the commodification of nature. These things are not only scientifically proven to be possible, but supported by logic and physics. We the People have the power, if we only stepped up to the plate to make it happen.

A-Z

Well, I have culled from my personal stash of notes, taken over the years with much enthusiasm, a list. I know how popular lists are. Eighty-percent of people love to read a good list. This one is fun because it uses the Alphabet to give structure to the concepts, an "A" to "Z" if you please. I first thought it was from The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People, but I may have the attribution wrong.
I thought it was interesting enough to share with all of my children, so here goes.
A SLEEP 8 HOURS
B EAT TWICE A DAY
C NO TEE VEE
D NO JUNK/FRANKENFOOD
E NO COMPLAINING
F NO GOSSIP
G RETURN A 5+ YEAR OLD E-MAIL
H EXPRESS THANKS TO A FRIEND
I WATCH A FUNNY MOVIE OR A COMIC
J WRITE A LIST OF IDEAS
K READ A SPIRITUAL TEXT
L SAVE A LIFE
M TAKE UP A HOBBY
N WRITE OUT YOUR ENTIRE SCHEDULE AND STOP DOING ONE THING
O SURPRISE SOMEONE
P THINK OF 10 PEOPLE YOU ARE GRATEFUL FOR
Q FORGIVE SOMEONE
R TAKE STAIRS INSTEAD OF ELEVATOR
S DON"T SAY YES WHEN YOU WANT TO SAY NO
T TELL SOMEONE YOU LOVE THEM
U DON"T HAVE SEX WITH SOMEONE YOU DON"T LOVE
V SHOWER/GET CLEAN
W READ A CHAPTER FROM A BIOGRAPHY OF ONE OF YOUR HEROES
X SPEND TIME WITH A FRIEND AND PLAN TO GET TOGETHER AGAIN
Y LIVE LIKE YOU MIGHT DIE TONIGHT
Z DEEPLY BREATHE

As we come into the light of the new year, let us give thanks for all the sacrifices that have been made for us by generations who had nothing to gain from their toil and let us seek to reward future generations with a world that we would have loved to inherit for ourselves!

I am always struck with the power of artesian springs to bring out the best in people. This park-like area near Green Bay has been developed with public use in mind, even though it is private property. 25 cents a gallon is cheap for live water issuing from the pressure of gravity. Pay by the honor system, relax on the bench as long as you need to. for those who didn't expect to stop, communal cups offered free of charge.

Words

Even our words are under attack from our soon to be administration. When I say security, it means the lowest crime peiod in over thirty years, it means being free from tyrants and fools, trying to meddle in my affairs, secure in my person and property, not bombs, weapons or espionage. Re-defining "security" to mean weapons, or police states, lists of undesireables, well, now how will we separate free speech from getting on the "enemies" list. Truly, this is how our current future state has evolved. The more intrusive the government has become on our personal lives, the worse the quality of life becomes. The steady erosion of all the New Deal programs has led once again to uberwealthy donor class of citizens who drive decisionmaking and the 99% who take the candidates that they purchase.

This piece of plywood has more lives to live, but already, it fed my family once when I painted it as a sign for a business. It became both my son's and daughter's desk ,so it helped with their education and development in addition to feeding them. It will have other uses, but for now, I hope it brings as much joy to you as it does me.

I remember my grandmother Alberta, everyone called her Bert or Berta. For a terse discussion, she would say, "We are going to have words." She meant that she was going to make her meaning extremely clear and there was going to be some sort of resolution made, and quick! If you were not prepared to "have words" with Grandma, it was best to just listen carefully and change your behavior immediately to avoid having to do it again later on. Our society needs to have words with the wordsmiths. I'm over fifty, for instance and have never heard of a single person who was pro-abortion, even though I have heard those words badied about by supposed "defenders of life". How many of those people fight for the rights of children who are born into the world, how many stand for the rights of males to stay intact, without sexual molestation which is done when the child is still trying to latch on to their mothers breast? How many fight for the rights of center-city folk to not live in food deserts? How many are on the front lines standing against cuts to nutrition programs and education? Yes, we certainly need to have words with these self-righteous single issue voters!

I am sorry to reflect such rancor, but it is all too often the rule rather than the exception that things get named by the existing power structure, they are the only ones who can push the discussion by their sheer financial capacities. Here are some of my favorite mis-spoken words and you can tell where the money came from to change the terminology we use to have effective dialog. Military calls it "friendly fire", in reality, it is shooting to kill your own guys! Accidental murder perhaps? Changing that one term would force our behavior to change, because the nature of discussion changes. Defining words properly is essential to good communication. Pollution control is another redic concept. It permanently supposes that there is such a place as "away". Controlling pollution is ultimately moving it around. The only fact that is missing from the discussion is that clean-up is always more expensive than reducing consumption, re-using products for many functions over the course of their life cycle, re-purpose, of recycle wastes, emulating natural cycles, in which nothing goes to waste. Pollution shell game may be a better way of expressing what most government regulations amount to.

Other examples exist and I'm sure you have heard them. Farm Bill, sounds good for farms right? What if we called it agro-corporate subsidy?  I have spoken with many farmers who are only offered credit with a bank, if they have specific plans to do corporate supplied, industrial scale farming that renders the soil off limits to most healthy soil organisms. These same farmers over report their harvest routinely to make sure that when they have a crop failure, they get the higest subsidy. The worst part is that they feel that they are doing nothing wrong. The growing numbers of farmers who are doing things right need to be supported fully, not the agro-giants and financial sectors. Respected agricultural researchers as far back as the Twenties and Thirties were seeing what the hippies and back to the land types have been saying continuously as well. Your soil is only as healthy as the microbial community that thrives in it. The basis of the higher food chain, which includes human beings begins below the surface of the soil with microscopic living organisms. when they are healthy, the plant community living on that soil would be healthier and contain more nutrients, be more resistant to pests and produce more biomass per acre than sickly plants would. Look at the budget for the Farm Bill and you will find huge outlays for doing the absolute wrong things and precdious little for transfoming acreage to at least carbon neutral if not carbon negative to build soils and counter climate destabilization. In the public debate, these ideas are met with the sound of crickets...

We need to parse our ideas and understanding using the best tools we have, and that is our mind itself and we know what a large part vocabulary has to our ability to think in ways that allow us to communicate. We must not let the discussion be carried out on terms sacrificed to the pyre of the oligarchs. Taking back our words is essential to speaking truth to power.

Earth Charter

PREAMBLE

We stand at a critical moment in Earth's history, a time when humanity must choose its future. As the world becomes increasingly interdependent and fragile, the future at once holds great peril and great promise. To move forward we must recognize that in the midst of a magnificent diversity of cultures and life forms we are one human family and one Earth community with a common destiny. We must join together to bring forth a sustainable global society founded on respect for nature, universal human rights, economic justice and a culture of peace. toward this end, it is imperative that we, the peoples of Earth, declare our responsibility to one another, to the greater community of life and to future generations.

Earth, Our Home

Humanity is part of a vast evolving universe. Earth, our home, is alive with a unique community of life. The forces of nature make existence a demanding and uncertain adventure, but Earth has provided the conditions essential to life's evolution. The resilience of the community of life and the well-being of humanity depend on preserving a healthy biosphere with all its ecological systems, a rich variety of plants and animals, fertile soils, pure waters and clean air. The global environment with its finite resources is a common concern for all. The protection of Earth's vitality, diversity and beauty is a sacred trust.

The Global Situation

The dominant patterns of production and consumption are causing environmental devastation,the depletion of resources and massive extinction of species. Communities are being undermined. The benefits of development are not shared equitably and the gap between rich and poor is widening. Injustice, poverty, ignorance and violent conflict are widespread and the cause of great suffering. An unprecedented rise in human population has overburdened ecological and social systems. The foundations of global security are threatened. These trends are perilous-but not inevitable.

The Challenges Ahead

The choice is ours: form a global partnership to care for Earth and one another or risk the destruction of ourselves and the diversity of life. Fundamental changes are needed in our values, institutions and ways of living. We must realize that when basic needs have been met, human development is primarily about being more, not having more. We have the knowledge and technology to provide for all and to reduce our impact on the environment. The emergence of a global civil society is creating new opportunities to build a democratic and humane world. Our environmental, economic, political, social and spiritual challenges are interconnected. Together we can forge inclusive solutions.

Universal Responsibility

To realize these aspirations, we must decide to live with a sense of universal responsibility, identifying ourselves with the whole Earth community as well as our local communities. We are at once citizens of different nations and of one world in which the local and global are linked. Everyone shares responsibility for the present and future well-being of the human family and the larger living world. The spirit of human solidarity and kinship with all life is strengthened when we live with reverence for the mystery of being, gratitude for the gift of life and humility regarding the human place in nature.

We urgently need a shared vision of basic values to provide an ethical foundation for the emerging world community. Therefore, together in hope we affirm the following independent principles for a sustainable way of life as a common standard by which the conduct of all individuals, organizations, businesses, governments and transitional institutions is to be guided and assessed.

Images added for your interest, your edification and for impact.

The ancients were not "primitive", they understood that the health of the planet requires sacrifice and that their health and wealth was determined by ecological integrity.

I. RESPECT AND CARE FOR THE COMMUNITY OF LIFE

1. Respect Earth and life in all its diversity.
    a. All beings are interdependent and every form of life has value regardless of its worth to humans.
    b. Affirm inherent dignity of all beings as well as their ability to reach their fullest potential.

2. Care for the community of life with understanding, compassion and love.
    a. Accept that with the right to own, to manage and use natural resources comes the duty to prevent environmental harm and to protect the rights of people.
    b. Affirm that with increased freedom, knowledge and power comes increased responsibility to promote the common good.

3. Build democratic societies that are just, participatory, sustainable and peaceful.
    a. Ensure that communities at all levels guarantee human rights and fundamental freedoms and provide everyone an opportunity to realize his or her full potential.
    b. Promote social and ecological justice, enabling all to achieve a secure and meaningful livelihood that is ecologically responsible.

4. Secure Earth's bounty and beauty for present and future generations.
    a.Recognize that the freedom of action of each generation is qualified by the needs of future generations.
    b. Transmit to future generations values, traditions and institutions that support the long-term health and flourishing of human and ecological communities.

In order to fulfill these four broad commitments, it is necessary to:

We really only have one choice.

II. ECOLOGICAL INTEGRITY

5. Protect and restore the integrity of Earth's ecological systems, with special concern for biological diversity and the natural processes that sustain life.
    a. Adopt, at all levels, sustainable development plans and regulations that make environmental conservation and rehabilitation integral to all development initiatives.
    b. Establish and safeguard viable nature and biosphere reserves, including wild lands and marine areas, to protect Earth's life support systems, maintain biodiversity preserving our natural heritage.
    c. Promote the recovery of endangered species and ecosystems.
    d. Control and eradicate non-native and Genetically modified organisms harmful to native species and the environment and prevent introduction of such harmful organisms.
    e. Manage the use of renewable resources such as water, soil, forest products and marine life in ways that do not exceed rates of regeneration and that protect the health of ecosystems.
    f. Manage the extraction and use of non-renewable resources such as minerals and fossil fuels in ways that minimize depletion and cause no serious environmental damage.

6. Prevent harm as the best method of environmental protection and, when knowledge is limited, apply a precautionary approach.
    a. Take action to avoid the possibility of serious or irreversible environmental harm even when scientific knowledge is incomplete or inconclusive.
    b. Place the burden of proof on those who argue that a proposed activity will not cause significant harm and make responsible parties liable for environmental harm.
    c. Ensure that decision making addresses the cumulative, long-term, long distance and global consequences of human activities.
    d. Prevent pollution of any part of the environment and allow no build-up of radioactive, toxic or other hazardous substances.
    e. Avoid military activities damaging tot he environment.

7. Adopt patterns of production, consumption and reproduction that safeguard Earth's regenerative capacities, human rights and community well-being.
    a. Reduce, reuse and recycle the materials used in production and consumption systems and ensure that residual waste can be assimilated by ecological systems.
    b. Act with restraint and efficiency when using energy and rely increasingly on renewable energy sources such as solar and wind.
    c. Promote the development, adoption and equitable transfer of environmentally sound technologies.
    d. Internalize the full environmental and social costs of goods and services in the selling price, enabling customers to identify products that meet the highest social and environmental standards.
    e. Ensure universal access to healthcare that fosters reproductive health and responsible reproduction.
    f. Adopt lifestyles that emphasize quality of life and material sufficiency in a finite world.

8. Advance the study of ecological sustainability and promote the open exchange and wide application of the knowledge acquired.
    a. Support international scientific and technical cooperation on sustainabiltiy , with special attention to the needs of developing nations.
    b. Recognize and preserve the traditional wisdom and spiritual wisdom in all cultures that contribute to environmental protection and human well-being.
    c. Ensure that information of vital importance to human health and environmental protection, including genetic information remains available in the public domain.

This image portrays one of the most heinous crimes against humanity that we witness routinely. To have char work, the particle sizes need to be far, far smaller than they are burying in this jungle. Also, unless char is micronized and treated through a process of mineralization, nutrification and biological inoculation, the benefits will more than be offset by loss of nutrients and minerals from the soil. "Hungry" char is the surest way to rob the soil of beneficial properties, especially nitrogen. I'm sure some bloated NGO or corporate welfare fraud is responsible for this deceitful, designed to fail project.

III. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC JUSTICE

9. Eradicate poverty as an ethical, social and environmental imperative.
    a. Guarantee the right to potable water, clean air, food security. uncontaminated soil, shelter and safe sanitation, allocating the national and international resources required to do so.
    b. Empower every human being with the education and resources to secure a livelihood and provide social security and safety nets for those who are unable to support themselves.
    c. Recognize the ignored, protect the vulnerable, serve those who suffer. enable them to develop their capacities and to pursue their aspirations.


10. Ensure that economic activities and institutions at all levels promote human development in an equitable and sustainable manner.
    a. Promote the equitable distribution of wealth within nations and among nations.
    b. Enhance the intellectual, financial, technical and social resources of developing nations and relieve them of onerous international debt.
    c. Ensure that all trade supports sustainable resource use, environmental protection and progressive labor standards.
    d. Require multinational corporations and international financial organizations to act transparently in the public good and hold them accountable for the consequences of their activities.

11. Affirm gender equality as prerequisite to sustainable development and ensure universal access to education, health care and economic opportunity.
    a. Secure the human rights of women and girls and end all violence against them.
    b. Promote the active participation of women in all aspects of economic, political, civil, social and cultural life as full and equal partners, decision makers, leaders and beneficiaries.
    c. Strengthen families and ensure the safety and loving nurture of all family members.

12. Uphold the right of all, without discrimination, to a natural and social environment supportive of human dignity, bodily health and spiritual well-being, with special attention to the rights of indigenous peoples and minorities.
    a. Eliminate discrimination in all its forms, such as that based on race, color, sex, sexual orientation, religion, language and national, ethnic or social origin.
    b. Affirm the right of indigenous people to their spirituality, knowledge, lands and resources and to their related practice of sustainable livelihoods.
    c. Honor and support the young people of our communities, enabling them to fulfill their essential role in creating sustainable societies.
    d. Protect and restore outstanding places of cultural and spiritual significance.

We are constantly planting seeds, this Earth Charter is a great way to get the seeds of ideas germinating!

IV. DEMOCRACY, NONVIOLENCE, PEACE

13. Strengthen democratic institutions at all levels, provide transparency and accountability in governance, inclusive participation in decision making and access to justice.
    a. Uphold the right of everyone to receive clear and timely information on environmental matters and all development plans and activities which are likely to affect them or in which they have an interest.
    b. Support local, regional and global civil society and promote the meaningful; participation of all interested individuals and organizations in decision making.
    c. Protect the rights to freedom of opinion, expression, peaceful assembly, association and dissent.
    d. Institute effective and efficient access to administrative and independent judicial procedures, including remedies and redress for environmental harm and the threat of such harm.4
    e. Eliminate corruption all public and private institutions.
    f. Strengthen local communities, enabling them to care for their environments and assign environmental responsibilities to the levels of government where they can be carried out most effectively.

14. Integrate into formal education and life-long learning the knowledge, values and skills fopr a sustainable way of life.
    a. Provide all, especially children and youth, with educational opportunities that empower them to contribute actively to sustainable development.
    b. Promote the contribution of the arts and humanities as well as the sciences in sustainability education.
    c. Enhance the role of the mass media in raising awareness of ecological and social challenges.
    d. Recognize the importance of moral and spiritual education for sustainable living.

15. Treat all beings with respect and consideration.
    a. Prevent cruelty to animals kept in human societies and protect them from suffering.
    b. Protect wild animals from methods of hunting, trapping and fishing that cause extreme, prolonged and avoidable suffering.
    c. Avoid or eliminate to the full extent possible the taking of or destruction of non-targeted species.

16. Promote a culture of tolerance, nonviolence and peace. 
    a. Encourage and support mutual understanding, solidarity and cooperation among all peoples and within and among nations.
    b. Implement comprehensive strategies to prevent violent conflict and use collaborative problem solving to resolve environmental conflicts and other disputes.
    c. Demilitarize national security systems to the level of a non-provocative defense posture and convert military resources to peaceful purposes, including ecological restoration.
    d. Eliminate nuclear, biologic and toxic weapons as well as any other weapons of mass destruction.
    e. Ensure that the use of orbital and outer space supports environmental protection and peace.
    f. Recognize that peace is the wholeness created by right relationships with oneself, other persons, other cultures, other life, Earth and the larger whole of which we are all part.

THE WAY FORWARD

As never before in history, common destiny beckons us to seek a new beginning. such renewal is the promise of these Earth charter principles. To fulfill this promise, we must commit ourselves to adopt and promote the values and objectives of the Charter.

This requires us to have a change of mind and heart. It requires a new sense of global interdependence and universal responsibility. We must imaginatively develop and apply the vision of a sustainable way of life locally, nationally, regionally and globally. Our cultural diversity is a precious heritage and different cultures will find their own distinctive ways to realize the vision. We must deepen and expand the dialogue that generated the earth Charter, for we have much to learn from the ongoing collaborative search for truth and wisdom.

Life often involves tensions between important values. This can mean difficult choices. However, we must find ways to harmonize diversity with unity, the exercise of freedom with the common good, short-term objective with long-term goals. Every individual, family, organization and community has a vital role to play. The arts, sciences, religions, educational institutions, media, businesses, non-govenmental organizations and governments are all called to offer creative leadership. The partnership of government, civil society and business is essential for effective governance.

In order to build a sustainable global community, the nations of the world must renew their commitment to the United Nations, fulfill their obligations under existing international agreements and support the implementation of Earth Charter principles with an international legally binding instrument on environment and development.

Let ours be a time remembered for the awakening of a new reverence for life, the firm resolve to achieve sustainability, the quickening of the struggle for justice and peace, the joyful celebration of life.

What's the Dif'?

I have seen a number of responses to the recent non-election, I mean the coming electoral college vote in the U.S. of A. We are complacent about the fact that the loser of our decidedly un-popular election will take the highest office in our nation after having lost by over three million votes. If everyone had voted who is qualified to, that would be over 1% better for the winner when compared to the loser, but only half of us actually turned out to vote, so the discrepancy is doubled. Two percent does not sound like much, but if our bodies contained two percent less water, that would be a problem. If we changed our fuel efficiency two percent, we could go to the gas station one less time each year. Fans of microbrews make a huge deal over beer that has two percent more alcohol and two percent interest change could cost thousands of dollars over the repayment period. The responses that have been the result of the recent elections in our nation seem to be overwhelming, but only to those that have watched the events of the last two months closely.

Some of people have decided to keep their heads down, hoping it will all blow over in four years. Others have reacted violently, against minorities, against those who they feel are "different", against their own interests, although they have not realized it yet. some have violently turned their heads away in anger, disgust, frustration and contempt for our system that not only allows, but condones the inequality of our citizens. Some understand that the campaign of the future leader of the free world was only based on one thing, a seemingly inexhaustible pot of money paired with lies. We have been told lies about what threatens our way of life, lies about who is to blame, lies about how we are going to "fix" things and lies about the past that are so ignorant of what our past was really like that they call into question the sanity of the 24% of our nation who cast their ballot in favor of the lies.

Yep, now we can live in an age where getting less than a quarter of the populace to stand up and cast their vote for you can still be called a "mandate". We must understand that when a person lies over 90% of the time, even this fiction can be perceived as real. Now, the real question is whether or not any of it matters. The oligarchs were going to run up the stock market regardless of who got put into office, they have a crash to oversee. The fleecing of America continues unabated and if letting people think that they too can participate in a get rich quick scheme, even if it only lasts a few moons, heck, all the better for those holding the vast majority of the wealth already. Every single person being proposed for the next administration's cabinet has been a vehement proponent of dissolving the agencies they are being selected to oversee. This would be somewhat akin to getting rid of slavery by simply killing all of the slaves.

I think that most of my readers have gathered that I am not a "fan" of big government. I probably would be considered a Libertarian if there was a way to assure that every single person would exhibit morality and ethics that are beyond reproach. However, until we create a race of honest human beings, who practice equitable distribution of resources based on compassion, humility and humanity, a race of human beings who are actively cooperative, compassionate and supportive of one another generally, eliminating government involvement in our lives is out of the question. The current corrupt system has a vested interest in convincing us that anyone who exhibits such traits are either hopelessly naive, living in a dreamworld, or just not paying attention. Is there anyone who still wonders why there are no lengths to which the corporate-owned media will go to any lengths to bring us images and stories of mayhem, destruction and senseless tragedy? This is an active attempt to get us to ignore the fact that our neighborhoods are currently safer than they have ever been, the world itself is suffering under fewer deaths and casualties from war than ever in our history and that we are, in fact, kind, loving, compassionate and cooperative at heart. none of these truths make for good television, burning buildings make compelling tee vee, even when the audio track seeks to get us to blame the victims. There is a reason that in the info-tainment industry their number one rule is, "If it bleeds, it leads."

The difference, and the reason that I spend hours each week researching, paying close attention and thinking about these sorts of issues stands in direct contrast to the thugs who are seeking to get us to sequester ourselves away from the world, shut our minds and eyes to the truth and to hide behind our black out curtains and tune in to our telescreens. People with far more money than I may ever have are in the business of collecting the royalties they get from your fear.

This stone circle, back-filled with soil will be the new home for my tee pee. Living in a circular home presents so many connections to the living planet that it is hard to communicate.

This concrete rectangle is the foundation for a sewage pumping station just down the block from where I live. All of this trash was found in just twenty minutes within a hundred foot radius of a trash can. When people perceive the world around them as hostile and hopeless, they are far more willing to participate in the destruction of our sacred planet.

Hide and Seek

We all remember the child's game that we used to play, making one person count while the others tried to hide. Typically, we made one person close their eyes and count to one hundred, then the others would scatter, looking for places to hide. We would go to empty closets, under beds or behind curtains if we were playing indoors, or under leaf piles, behind or up trees, behind a stump or wood pile if we were playing outside. Well the game is still going on, but it is with ideas and the stakes of the game are our collective souls.

The way I see it, there are those who are all-in on a losing hand, but they control the words we use to discuss politics, religion, and even such discreet emotions as love or fidelity. The people who set up the deck are now way over extended and there are not that many cards left to play. A friend, who follows the oil and gas industry like a hawk has informed me for many moons that the extended debt burden being carried by the folks who have given us the frack boom, is far more than what led to the housing crash. Monies invested in the drill baby drill economy have soared, just like when the housing market was on the double digit increase. The trouble is, the largest producing "boom" towns that have sprung up, replete with their crime rates, bars, brothels, and drug use.

Aside: Ironically, it is often the super religious politically right advocates that think these economies represent "opportunity", because they have put their money into a bet on that future success, that everyone else seems to have had. That is how bull markets get their name, they feed on themselves like chickens in too small a pen. When the tipping point is reached, either folks have overextended and need their money back or the realization is made that everyone was delusional, and the scales tip, yielding no leverage, or value in purchasing, for anyone in the process.

There are areas experiencing busts already and the whole region will be non-producing in less time than most mortgages, certainly the one established to fund the offensive pipeline. Finally, there are people standing, to say "NO!" to big oil. Not until the pipeline company with the worst safety record of any pipeline company, got to the point of attempting to crossing a river that provides eighty million downstream residents with drinking water, did concerned citizens say, "Enough is enough!"
Now, is not the time to fold and let the oligarchs take even more money, it is far past time to step in a new direction. Fossil fuel from the frack fields takes about three BTUs of energy at the well head, to liberate five BTUs of energy. Offsite you have sand mining, washing and drying which requires more energy to be expended, then you also have any other adjuncts, chemicals, plasticizers, polymers, etc. that are created far from the frack site that must be hauled in, burning even more of the diesel fuel that is not yet out of the ground.

In essence, we are spending the lion's share of the money, "investing" in future energy by burning all (perhaps more than all) the energy we can, to get that future energy. Pissing up a rope would make as much sense. The moment the "market" understands this, investors will flee faster than they did from the housing market, but the big energy companies will be judged "too big to fail" and you know what happens next. Our tax dollars will flow to them in even larger amounts than they currently do with the corporate welfare they get, it does not matter how many lawyers and lobbyists they have to pay, they make it up on the back end anyway.

Check out where "wealth" hides, where it ebbs and flows, who cleans up on both sides of every transaction. You may not like what you see when you find it, but you will never see the terrain the same way again. When the enlightenment hits, you will want to spend as few dollars as possible anywhere, but most especially with the multi-national corporate welfare recipients whose "stars" (logos) are on the new Corporate States of America flag,  just to break the stranglehold the oligarchs have on us.

Resistance is Fertile!

Resistance is Fertile

My work involves building soils. The reason I have put so much effort into this process as I have has not been because that is where the money is, but because, it is where I can do the most good. In fact, as I have found, there is so little understanding about the difference between soil and dirt, that there may never be money in healing soils, or making them healthy, but that is not enough to get me to quit. There are more important things than money. I know that saying those words in our current culture may seem silly, naive or idealistic, but they are true. Life has very important things, like support, security, abundance and relationship. when we feel integrated with the larger whole, that in and of itself is important. We are designed to adapt to our surroundings, but a toxic environment, or one that has been stripped of resources often creates adaptations in us that validate, support and perpetrate behaviors that are not healthy, not sustainable and not able to offer anyone true security.

It seems that many are finally asking the questions that I asked myself four decades ago. My sister may have summed it up best when she told me that she wanted a bumper sticker that asks simply, Whom do you serve? My first post asked that question and it continues to burn itself into my world view every single day. Every dollar we spend, every moment we squander is playing right into the hands people we may never see, or know, or want to believe that we are "serving". It turns out that this is a very deep question with such distantly removed answers that many of us can barely scratch the surface of meanings that it holds. They say, still waters run deep and this year, perhaps we all need to sit a little more still and just appreciate the moving target that is the rise of fascism in our nation. Many of us continue to serve the needs of well entrenched power brokers, but more and more are finding their way toward truth and real justice.

No security can come from staying still, although taking a breather, to get your head on straight is always helpful. The active engagement that creates change is probably the most important aspect of resistance and leads to revolutionary changes that can last for generations. I heard a story this week about a child. Not a bad child, but one exhibiting the behaviors of a bully. This child has been born into a family structure that offers him very little in the way of attention. There are basically only two phases to his existence. He is either taken along and required to have only grown-up experiences, or left to his own devices, which in his family means retreat into his computer. There are no child appropriate activities, questions, discussion or relationships for him to grow through. In many ways he has been faced with a choice, face abuse and neglect in the company of the adults in his life, or retreat into the altered state of digitally mediated experience. One cannot blame him for the cocoon of distraction in which he chooses to live, but what others are experiencing is that the young child becomes easily frustrated and lashes out at others as a result.

When actively responding to our environment becomes commonplace, we can build, create, learn and grow in ways that are not possible when working within a framework of digitally mediated sub-routines and face time with our computers. I have been writing blog posts for over seven years now and not one session at the keyboard has "created" anything that has not first been experienced in real life. Not one concept or idea was born while sitting here typing away at the keyboard. The over six hundred posts have come from actual-factual real-life experiences in which I was paying attention, sharing myself openly with the world around me and participating in a relationship with a large and sometimes scary world. don't get me wrong, life is certainly not all about abundance and security, there are serious problems that abound as well. That is why resistance becomes necessary.

Many, when confronting those of us who are active participants in the revolution that has never been televised ask the same sorts of questions. What about violence, do you see the revolution turning violent? This is because they can fathom nothing but serving their own violent slave masters. Yesterday at Standing Rock, the "police" (which many in the revolution that has not been televised call pigs) attacked peaceful protesters with water cannon, rubber bullets and sound cannons. When bullies meet frustration, they can only resort to violence. They serve the existing system of power and control tactics, belief in violence and for their limited understanding, those are the only options. On the other hand, what people who ask this question do not realize is that, "We are peaceful loving people, and we are standing, standing for our lives!". Those of us who have been walking our talk for over thirty years are astonished at the level of ignorance required for people to even ask about violence. Those who think that violence can solve problems, are in fact, the problem.

I have made conscious efforts to resist oppression by enhancing soil quality. Our ancestors handed down so much knowledge that we would be foolish to ignore it, but on a daily basis we still do forget. embedded in the phrase, and concept that a chain is only as strong as it's weakest link begs the question, where can we find a weak link in the chain of life? it is perhaps so obvious, that most people never even look, but the soil under our feet is one of the links that has been treated like dirt from the beginning. In most areas, we had reduced the fertility and health of the soil even before we knew that it was a thing. We have been so busy serving faraway interests that we neglected and abused the very land upon which our lives and health are determined. In many ways, the most revolutionary act that we can participate in is to feed our neighbors and ourselves healthy food. That requires healthy soil.

I have seen the riots, the property crimes that have been perpetrated by mobs in the past. I fully expect that there will be riots again, but they are far more likely when a team wins the Super Bowl, a Major League Pennant or a trophy. It is fairly rare that people riot because they cannot feed or house their families. There have always been agents provocateur and false flag attacks designed to make the public thing that anyone willing to stand up for their rights is a threat, but that is completely different that wanton destruction that the current powers that be are willing to perpetrate to "protect" their perceived interests. rebuilding the soils that blew away during the dust bowl days can be done, it is certainly possible. We have the tools and technologies, we even have millions of displaced workers that with a bit of education and training could recreate soil that is healthy and productive virtually anywhere on the planet, what we lack is the will. As long as we continue to serve the fossil energy interests, as long as we allow the military industrial complex to operate their destructive shell game, as long as we let the big money ride on the funding of destructive boom/bust cycles, we will have dislocation, loss and despoiled landscapes to leave future generations.

 

Resistance is Fertile!, is the get down to business arm of ECO-Tours. In addition to the one square foot ECO-Tour, we offer experiential workshops that can transform acreage, double the production of container gardens, long established food plots. We sell products used to make helthy biochar and use it to enhance soils wherever you are. By uniquely tailoring your char to local conditions, you will be unleashing the power of billions of microbes to make soils healthy, resistant to drought and friable (more easily tilled) This black gold is the ecological opposite of oil, whereas oil coats and kills, the top quality char we begin with is porous and supportive of life especially after it has been treated in specific ways. In a nutshell, the instructions that come with your char are what the real value of our product is. We explain making char, mineralization, micronization, mositurization, microbes and maturation, we encourage people to find local, "organic" sources for those inputs. The instructions are the outline of our class, so further research is required to get the whole art/science involved in charmaking.

 

Each step could be researched further and the resulting char would be better for the extra study taken by the char maker. I have been making char and biochar purposefully for half a dozen years and continue to learn new tools and techniques to refine my actions and inputs, to get the best char for my efforts. The second reason that I encourage folks to take the full course, is to help students and aspiring charmasters to think about cycles of life in both microcosmic relationships and the parallel between the human organism and our societies, creating culture. To fully understand this aspect of soil building, culture affirming, and transformation can take several years, but many begin to understand the importance of the annual cycles after the first one. Even when conditions are not optimal for biologically active cultures, conditions can be made "ripe" for them. There are many inorganic relationships that are needed to precede inoculation with microbes, so they can take up residence easily and find much needed resources when they are introduced to the relatively sterile, but activated char. Since this is part art, part science, it is also important to re-experience certain parts of the training, because different needs occur during different stages of our development. Understanding that this has a microcosmic correlate as well is also part of the training. sometimes it is necessary to "put up" in times if abundance for the future use or satisfaction of needs that have not yet become immediate. 

 

In our courses, there is also intensive and extensive grappling with concepts of the give back; the art/science of which our ancestors were intimately aware of and responsive to. Tribal people living around the globe all have intact cultural rites that honor Mother Earth, we need to emulate that same santity of the planet when we seek to build soils. Charmaking is very ritualistic and both the cauldron and the empty pot figure greatly into all of these processes. often the things we add will not fully be utilized for decades, but we invest the newly made soil with it so that the creatures inhabiting those biomes will never know lack. We may only be raising healthy microbial communities, but their participation, in healthy soils equal more than a ton of biomass per acre!

The classes that ECO-Tours of Wisconsin Inc. offer allow individuals to become caretakers of the soil, double their agricultural output, reduce the need for irrigation and sequester carbon in healthy soils, healing the planet literally from the ground up. a complete series of classes, lasting thirteen moons, three hours thirteen times over the course of the year cost only $200. Single classes are twenty bucks. The classes are taught by real people in real time each full moon at our base camp here in Green Bay, if distance is an issue, I am working through the digital realm to teach the same material through online courses. Please contact us directly in one of three ways. Call, (nine 2 zero) double eight four, triple two four or use snail mail by writing to ECO-Tours of Wisconsin Inc. 1445 Porlier street Green Bay, WI 54301-3334 or e-mail me directly at tnsaladino42@hotmail.com.

Flotsam vs Jetsam

When aboard a sinking ship, or one that is listing dangerously, frequently the order is given to jettison all unnecessary baggage and cargo. This is a last ditch attempt to reduce the displacement, (weight) of the hull and contents by unburdening your vessel. If there can be enough thrown overboard, the craft might be able to be limped into port or otherwise salvaged. In the event that the craft does not survive afloat, the remaining material that floats on the surface after the wreck sinks is known as flotsam.

I have written on this interesting pairing of words before, but since the United States of America's recent Presidential election, perhaps it is time to revisit them. There are many, around our great nation who have been feeling, I believe inappropriately, but by design; like their lives and lifestyles are "under threat". some of this has been  pre-designed through decades of victim mentality. Back as far as Phil Donohue and early television confessional/confrontational type shows, the globe has been scoured, for deplorables whose lives had crashed because of their proclivities. We even have judgemental "cases" brought to collective attention at many times higher rates than have ever occurred in the general population. It has been said that some people were just actors who wanted a free trip to be on Montel or Jerry Springer, so they would just play the parts of immoral or unethical folks to keep the ratings up. The vast, vast majority of people are good...they are never featured on the tee vee.

So, our ship of state has become unstable, would it not be wise to unload the burden of this victim mentality? We are awash in trumped up rhetoric that says we are "under attack", but the real harm comes from pouring money, resources and energy into destruction. The way that we really are victims is reliant on us continuing to consume corporate media.

This blog has existed all along as a free service to humanity. The numbers of readers who ever clicked on the "donate" button has been slim, but I must point out the fact that it has been a part of this blog since day one. We stand in opposition to the corporate media, I still believe that without a functioning fourth Estate, there can be no democracy, and that is by design as well. When you pare down the ship of state to it's hull only, the keel is the direction the vessel heads. It is laid by the "laws of the land", the ethos that informs the citizenry. The essence of national or global pride, exists in this ethical framework. Because we feel buoyed along the timeline of history be the cohesion and prime rib of our vessel. The ribs are established in my nation, The U. S. of America, by the great documents, the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. They give shape to our ship of state and help us to stay true to our founders intent. The planks, which keep the water out are like the policies enacted into law and the judicial reigns on power. The executive branch, ideally is like the packing between the planks, by filling in the gaps, perhaps, they fulfill the most important role. Without the executive branch, the ship of state would founder and be useless to anyone. The President himself is in the position of a Captain, but must have their messages publicized by the media. That becomes difficult when your buffoonery and lack of intellect or cohesive plans riddle the vessel.

Additionally, the fourth estate, independent media, is like an aid to the captain, unable to make the ship do anything, unless We the People fall in and make the "commands" so. The President can lead only by bully pulpit and through inspiring the people to fund the means for change, without the news reaching the citizens, and reaching them clearly in ways they can understand, there is no one motivated to push Congress to send any bills up to the Executive. The role of the media, at the time of the founding fathers, was posted as bills or read aloud at taverns (the faceboook of their day). Today, corporate welfare recipients and the oligarchs have tailored those messages to bear almost no resemblance to reality in and around America. The massive protests and outrage of the water protectors, the 99% movement, the Rainbows, for generations before, the flood of people returning to the land all want more and better and the fourth estate that I envision will speak to the better angels of our nature. Publicize what is going right around the world. The millions of good deeds and inspirational works that take place all around us all the time...

We the People were always the captains of our own destiny, or at least crew. We just forget sometimes, or are made to feel like victims. It takes a more mature nation to understand this and to act on making necessary changes for a nation to grow up. We have been acting like a spoiled brat increasingly addicted to a dangerous substance. This has a parallel in our larger culture as well. Fossil energy is dead, science has proven the efficacy of renewable energy sources and solved the storage problem as well. One more thing to be jettisoned. If we are to keep this ship of state afloat, we will need far more cohesive ideas and concepts floated amongst the American public. We have rallied before. The tribe of people coming of age today are the baby boom of the baby boom and they are not taking shit any longer. more young people than ever are demanding change, but not the kind based on turning the clocks back fifty years. we the People are intent on stepping into better directions and as long as we do not have an inspired leader, a statesperson and a diplomat, at the helm, we will founder as a nation.

To keep things afloat, now, more than ever, we have to throw overboard as many useless parts of our lives as possible. The energy suckers, the time wasters, the unwise habits and policies that are a drain on our society. I know that i have redoubled my efforts to make the Earth more stable, more productive and more supportive of healthy life than it was before my lifetime. Many others are doing the same thing. We all need to share our expertise and experiences so that others can learn the knowledge, skills and attitudes that are required to make these same changes as well. In the early days of the ecological movement, we had teach-ins, today we can google instructions on how do do most anything!

 If we can get rid of enough useless stuff, we may yet be able to salvage what is left that is affirming, and life supporting. If, on the other hand, we cling to that which we have been told, the lies of the oligarchs, we can only receive the wrath of the "bust" after they are done collecting the abundance of the "boom" I have written on boom and bust economies before as well and we are caught in a place between hard and harder. Most of the nation has been plowed over and is now bust. The few remaining booms are running dangerously out of steam. The next big thing is probably to get small. If we don't negotiate the next decade with deft precision, far too many pitfalls exist to avoid. There will be some flotsam from failed industries, but nearly everywhere there is waste, it is a possibility for something to arise anew, transforming that waste into abundance as well.

What Would You Do?

This week, the plaintiffs in a case that claimed that Trump University was a sham, a money-making scheme in which they were not offered education for their money, but false hope, decided to settle. Accepting half their money back. I don't know enough of the details, but the timing is critical to understanding the motivations and behavior of our future President of these United States. Getting half your money back may seem to be some consolation, but when you go into the marketplace to buy anything from a loaf of bread to a car, if it was rotten inside or would not perform as advertised, you would get all of your money back, without question.

This says far more about the defendant than about the 3500 plus lawsuits that the President-elect faces. This one suit involves about 7 thousands of individuals who collectively paid over fifty million dollars to this fake "school". Now some say that the buyer is to beware, but the courts term what the institution did was fraud and the future President and his managers faced federal racketeering charges as well. I would say that giving half the money back to make these two particular lawsuits "go away" constitutes another sort of fraud altogether.

The fact that this sort of legal "protection", being able to give your customers half their money back, when your "product" was worthless to begin with, presents a clear case for not allowing criminals to run businesses. The Attorney General of Florida, who stalled the case there against The Donald, until after the election, is now being offered a cabinet level position. This is dangerously suggestive of criminality. If you tried to craft a scheme of deception, collusion and deceitful side-stepping of laws that was more heinous, it would be hard to do. In the end, we have bad actors working in concert to get what they want at the expense of thousands of others. Perhaps tens of thousands of us will be hurt financially by these sorts of dealings. In the end, the whole nation suffers from the legal wrangling and exploitative ways of one man and his very powerful "friends".

Never mistake that this was not planned in advance, precipitated by wanton greed and/or facilitated by the cozy relationships that our future President buys outright. I would not want to step aside and allow a criminal to continue to get away with hurting people. I would not want to settle for half what I am rightfully owed. In this case, at least we are shown the true colors of this particular snake in the grass.

My wife and I recently spent $16K renovating a single apartment, but it changed the place from a rotting and disgusting mess that could have been condemned into a wonderful place that is bright, spacious, airy and beautiful.

This is what real estate "development" looks like when practiced by a person committed to the welfare of those who will shelter in their properties, one who pays a fair wage for the services they require and who has a commitment to future generations. Sadly, the system is rigged for those who would prefer just tearing down the historic buildings built by the hands of our ancestors, putting up giant structures made of imported concrete and steel by "illegal" immigrants at slave wages. There will be no multi-billion dollar ad campaign to get tenants, or side deals that enrich the developer by stealing other folks' fortunes. There will not even be any federal, state or local monies flowing in to my project. Just my own hard work and integrity, but you cannot take that to the bank, they would rather eat the steak but leave us the sizzle.

This is the same apartment from roughly the same angle just six moons later. I would like to publicly thank our plumber, Eric Vandenhuevel, Jim Havercorn, the neighborhood business called Outlaw Plaster, my brother-in-law, Peter Burns, son-in-law, Xak Melum, sister-in-law, Mary Nichols, my wife Nancy, my son, Jade, our neighbor, Dan Leiterman and the great guys at Metzler Electric for their help in moving this project toward completion. Great leaders acknowledge that their work would not be possible without those who helped with the work. We all stand on the shoulders of giants!

Honesty is telling the truth, integrity is doing so when it is not popular. When you have enough cash to buy your way out of anything, you can throw your weight around and pay off those you hurt, when you only have your reputation, you begin to understand that it takes a lifetime to build that and only a single moment can destroy it, so you really do have to hold yourself to the highest standards, not just in thought, but in action as well. This apartment and the one upstairs are now offered to anyone coming through Northeast Wisconsin through airbnb. My wife and I have made the commitment that any home in which we invest, we want to fix it up as nice as the one we live in. We will never live in a penthouse, while our customers are forced to live on half their money. We will never offer a product or service that is not worth every penny we ask in the marketplace and we will never reneg on our promises, that sort of behavior is for losers.
 

One Bully Or Another

Millions have said it, hundreds of millions know it, billions around the world feel the pain caused by it. Our systems of government have been broken. The oligarchs install the people who best suit their needs. In my lifetime I have seen the results of letting this continue. The breathtaking paucity of ideas expressed by the two major candidates for President of the United States of America breaks the hearts of virtually everyone who has been paying even a shred of attention to their antics over the past two years or so. We are seeing the seething hate of folks who think they are discriminated against by the current system morph into hate for "minorities", who collectively make up the majority of the population. We are also seeing those who have been abused by the system the most being bullied into supporting a candidate who has applauded every step of their trail of tears, not as a compassionate supporter, but as a cheerleader for business as usual (in other words, greed, racketeering exploitation and continuous exploitation at the hands of the uberwealthy). Is it any wonder that the average United States citizen just wants the electoral process to be over?

Is it really a choice when you must choose between a corrupt and merciless political pawn, seeking to be Queen and an avowed racist, sexist and former billionaire who has squandered his fortune destroying the lives and fortunes of countless people? The majority think not, however, according to the oligarch-owned media, these are the choices which confront us. Their minions and "believers" tell us that the other choices are futile "throw away" votes, worth less than an old tissue. Some even claim, with a sense of self-righteous authority, that a vote for a candidate that you actually believe would make a good President, or that represents the only viable option for saving human life on the planet, will be a vote for the person we dislike more. Those who are buying the big lie are convinced that this is the best we can do. I have voted for people who lost elections before and that rhetoric does not scare me. I know, in every fiber of my being, that if I had voted for the lesser of the two evils more than once, I could not live with myself. When we make mistakes, we must learn to live with ourselves. Part of the act of self-forgiveness involves making sure we never make that mistake again. Learning from the mistakes we make is part of the healing process.

My mother used to teach me that bullies do not care one whit about their prey. The actions of every bully, down through the ages has been about their own feelings of inadequacy, their own feelings that have grown out of a sense of lack of love, their own belief that they have to "prove" their worth by their attacks on others. I believe that I have posted the Power and Control wheel before, but to give this post some visual content, here we go again:
Once you understand these terrible processes, once you have felt the sting of them perpetrated upon you, once you understand that the only reason those who use these tools of oppression continue to use them is because our culture inculcates the values upon which they are based, only then can one realize the depth of depravity that gave rise to them in the first place. The psychological point of view from which these actions grow is the abused and neglected child that lives within all of us.

I have had many people argue, claiming "My parents loved me.", "I had the best parents, they never raised a finger toward us." or "In my family, we always knew that we were loved." Some have even claimed that, "Some people are just born psychopaths." Science has proven otherwise. all children are born compassionate, concerned for the welfare of others, cooperative and gregarious. One of the best proofs of this comes when a baby cries in the supermarket and all the other children turn to look. They actually care about that child that they don't even know. We were all like that once and only through experiencing our own abuses and neglect at the hands of those who raise us do we become callous and/or annoyed by the cries of people who are hurting. I have seen abusive doctors, lawyers, teachers, soldiers, politicians and religious leaders reduced to blubbering snot-nosed children when they uncover the deepest roots of their own belief that "tough love" is a thing, that abusing others and trampling others rights to be supported and affirmed are less than their own. The justification we use is simple enough once we learn to see it. It goes like this. I felt hurt by people who loved me, so the act of hurting others is actually an expression of love for them. However, when we learn to read the messages that lie beyond the kaleidoscopic lens of the power and control wheel, we see that continuing this abuse, generation on generation can only create more pain and suffering.

Please share this post with as many people as you know in the U.S.of A. We have the largest tool of oppression on the planet, the U.S. military and we are allowing them to export hate around the globe. If for no other reason than to stop the bombing, going on right now across seven nations illegally, we must turn our backs on these practices and call out the power and control exhibited all around us, every day. I have said it before, but I will end with it again, "We are peaceful, loving people and we are voting, voting for our lives!"