9/18/11

As pertinent now as he was back then

My Country ’Tis of Thee by W. E. B. Du Bois : The Poetry Foundation:

"Let laments swell the breeze
And wring from all the trees
Sweet freedom’s song.
Let laggard tongues awake,
Let all who hear partake,
Let Southern silence quake,
The sound prolong. "

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Famine in Broad Relief

Sorry for the double entendre
But a NYT book review reminded me today that
Democracies do not have famines
Despotic nations do
Ergo
Global democratic revolution
No more despots
Anywhere
Including homes
Period
End of post

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Everyone needs to get their cyber act together

Cyber Security and the UK's Critical National Infrastructure | Chatham House: Independent thinking on international affairs: "All organizations should look in more depth at their dependencies and vulnerabilities. Awareness and understanding of cyberspace should be 'normalised' and incorporated and embedded into standard management and business practices within and across government and the public and private sectors"

Apply the all globally.

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C. S. Peirce on the early scientists

The Fixation of Belief:

"The early scientists, Copernicus, Tycho Brahe, Kepler, Galileo, Harvey, and Gilbert, had methods more like those of their modern brethren. Kepler undertook to draw a curve through the places of Mars; and to state the times occupied by the planet in describing the different parts of that curve; but perhaps his greatest service to science was in impressing on men's minds that this was the thing to be done if they wished to improve astronomy; that they were not to content themselves with inquiring whether one system of epicycles was better than another but that they were to sit down to the figures and find out what the curve, in truth, was. He accomplished this by his incomparable energy and courage, blundering along in the most inconceivable way (to us), from one irrational hypothesis to another, until, after trying twenty-two of these, he fell, by the mere exhaustion of his invention, upon the orbit which a mind well furnished with the weapons of modern logic would have tried almost at the outset."

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This Bill Clinton Video is Worth A Look

Bill Clinton feels Obama's pain - CBS News:

I liked the Cheney part at the end best. Otherwise it is Clinton Realism - the kind in which he did no wrong.


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Scalise and Bilbray Discredit GOP in Solyndra Hearing

Watch these bozos for five minutes and make up your own mind. The tape should be at C-SPAN. 

A gnat compared to the corrupt elephant of big oil.

Let me revise the headline. 

The GOP credit is so low that these guys must simply be classed with the worst of the lot. 

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Low self esteem dispatch it with one breath

Access Abba Within and Win - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Low self esteem dispatch it with one breath
Breathe in say Abba is within me now
Breathe out place every burden upon him
Breathe in let your new partnership begin"

More at the link above.

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None can reach through these wilds

Dry Your Tears All is Well - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Dry your tears all is well
Said Abba to the child
There is no cause to cry
None can reach through these wilds"

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A Visionary Poem

Our World is Enslaved by Oil and War - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"We Need a Wider Movement that Sees Beyond Green. A Visionary Poem"

At the link above.

My "All Along The Watchtower"

Pride's Shaky Footing - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Pride goes before a fall that's true
The Seer softly said
The general just shook his head
The sky above was red"

My "All Along The Watchtower" continues at the link above

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Tolerance does not mean giving in

Tolerance - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Tolerance
Does not
Mean giving in
It means rising above
It knows there's always time
It's observation without casting
Stones then letting
Anger go
Away"

'via Blog this'

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"I came to simply say Abba is near"

Abba's Way: On The Messiah:

"I came to simply say Abba is near,
Repent, believe, this is the good news now.
And Abba will live happily within,
All those who turn from life’s idolatries,
Enjoying life with Abba deep inside.
The very being that gives being to all,
The very source of goodness, light of life."

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Why Progressives Cede Ground To The Right


"The ever-deepening crisis of global capitalism that is destroying so many people’s lives, instead of being met with revolution by the “progressive class” is being met with reactionary cries of spend less, lay off public workers, dismantle public programs, get rid of government altogether."

Progressives got fat and happy when they realized that win or lose they could prosper if they had certain political chops. I watched this close up and personal. It began in the 1970s and hit speed with the Clintons. The lie to all this was named Phil Gramm who euchred everyone with his economic nostrums. The inadvertent lassitude of the Clintons revealed the weak underbelly of what progressivism became. The binary between Clintonians and the Right Wing Conspiracy are the First and Second from which the Third of a redemptive radicalism will emerge. It will not be called progressive it will be called experimental democratic global revolution - which to say it exists but is as yet unnamed. It contains things you can read about here and in few other places.

How little we believe you give us all

Winning The War Within Collected Sonnets:

"How little we believe you give us all
And save us from raw greed and envy’s yoke
Yet just as you know every sparrow’s fall
You know our prayer before a word is spoke"

Amazing grace. Know how you know? You can feel it. But you can't will it. It is thus there. It goes as it will. The dominant reality is a sense of odd freedom. A looseness. Some confidence. Gratitude. Knowing you are not alone. Openness to what is before your eyes. There is more.

My Hermeneutic Meets Matthew Ten

Windows on The Bible:

"He says those who confess Him will be confessed by Him to God. I take this to be a creedal statement that rings false because its apparent meaning is that all one would need to do is say a few words to be in with the deity. In fact we are already in. If we credit Jesus that is simply because he is the main author of our understanding."

More up there.

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Seminal Moments in The Life of My Hero's Father

The Complete History of Adam Panflick:

"Melchizadek had no apparent problems. He was quiet and acquiescent. He knew from an early age what he wanted. He and his uncle Stanley maintained close, even intimate, contact during Melchizadek’s earliest years. “Find the right friends, boy,” Stanley told him at least a-hundred times. They would walk hand in hand by the lake. But one day Stanley surprised everyone by settling the bulk of his substantial estate on ten worthy widowed ladies in Cleveland with instructions that they be cared for for throughout their lives. He then departed without a word. He went by train to New York, by steamer to Southampton and from there to Chipping Norton. He lived out his days in hermetic obscurity, dying in his 99th year."

More at link above.

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If you try to put yourself in the shoes of Jesus

How Did Jesus See Himself? - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"But Jesus saw himself as Abba's beloved and everyone on earth as Abba's beloved and it has taken until today even to begin to understand the truth that was there all along."

Considerably more above.

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Jesus was the first human being willing to acknowledge the reality of who WE are.

Embracing the Blasphemy of Jesus - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Jesus gave us the Lord's prayer and this prayer clearly states that heaven and earth are to become the same . The prayer suggests we can and should forgive the wrongs of others. As we forgive, we are forgiven our wrongdoing,"

More at the link above.

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I love Lady Gaga for all the things she's not

Why I Love Lady Gaga Updated - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"I love Lady Gaga for all the things she's not."

Specified at the link above.

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As Ancient Orthodoxies Crumble

Ancient Orthodoxies - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Bonhoeffer's
World come
Of age seems
Debateable but his religionless
Christianity appears to be
Making strides as
Ancient orthodoxies
Crumble"

'via Blog this'

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Idolatry is the Root Sin

Types of Idolatry - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Idolatry is the Root Sin. It is Valuing Other Other G-ds Instead of Abba Alone. Abba is the Nameless One Who Said I Am Who I Am to Moses. Jesus is the Bearer of Abba's Values"

'via Blog this'

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Nonviolence created the most auspicious change since the Civil War

Dumb Wars - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Nonviolence helped create the most auspicious change in America since the Civil War. No one is saying we do not need a good war now and then. Like the one against Hitler. That was the last good one we fought. The rest were and remain dumb."

'via Blog this'

Sprawl Is A Deadly Nightmare

Sprawl is a deadly recipe for human living and it will either end up being bulldozed or we will start to transform it into cyber-communities that are car free. We may manage to entirely ruin both natural environs and human environs at once because of our commitment to the internal combustion engine and its fossil fuel.


The only response to this is car-free cyber cities

Defining Cities in a Metropolitan World - Neighborhoods - The Atlantic Cities:

"Our ever more interconnected, urbanized world therefore presents a challenge to academics and researchers who aim to quantify and better understand cities. Where does a city really begin and end? These days there are as many ways to measure a metro area as there are arguments for and against each one. To help visualize, let’s use Los Angeles as an example."

All this is is ecumenopolis unfolding


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Pollyanna anyone

Peircelets:

"We are, doubtless, in the main logical animals, but we are not perfectly so. Most of us, for example, are naturally more sanguine and hopeful than logic would justify. We seem to be so constituted that in the absence of any facts to go upon we are happy and self-satisfied; so that the effect of experience is continually to contract our hopes and aspirations."

'via Blog this'

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Communion requires no priest to make it efficacious

Original Biblical Songs: Communion Song:

You can listen to this and take communion anywhere and any time.


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I'm not kidding about the coach thing

Obama should appear with a coaches cap and sweatshirt
Not like Dukakis in a tank
But natural
We need a slam dunk big time for the people
We need a game face on
We need to push these pussies to the wall and leave them there
We need to expose them as frauds
But most of all we need a coach to make up the plays and
Call them as the game proceeds
There is only one mantra now
Beat them

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Obama needs a coach identity

We need to see from Obama the sort of human aura we associate with a good coach. When people start calling him coach we will know he is connecting. Until then he will seem distant and faintly indistinct.

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Obama makes a plus point

Obama to seek higher tax rate for the rich - CBS News: "(AP) WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama is expected to seek a new base tax rate for the wealthy to ensure that millionaires pay at least at the same percentage as middle income taxpayers.

A White House official said the proposal would be included in the president's proposal for long term deficit reduction that he will announce Monday. The official spoke anonymously because the plan has not been officially announced.

Obama is going to call it the "Buffett Rule" for Warren Buffett, the billionaire investor who has complained that rich people like him pay a smaller share of their income in federal taxes than middle-class taxpayers"

But what he still has to do is maintain a running narrative so that all f the bill gets voted up or down. No vote, he loses. He needs to shame the GOP into subservience to the people.


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The President has hit the same wall he knew was there all along

ShortFormContent at Blogger: Time for President to declare war on GOP:

"The President has hit the same wall he knew was there all along. He needs to say pass this bill and mean it, the whole bill. Make them vote it up or down. If they will not introduce it, have the people force them to. This is the last straw."

Why do I shift from my mantra of it's OUR job to push this through to it's the President's job to lead this to victory? Because we cannot act with requisite strength unless we know where he will stand tomorrow the next day and the next. Even in a pragmaticist world there are limits. This is one. No more wiggle room. Up or down.

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It all begins with non-idolatry

New Tao Posts: The Tao set forth the values of this world:

"The Tao set forth the values of this world
To set the ends creation would achieve
And conscious life is now discovery
Of what they are and that our choice is free"

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Holding a Bible on a jerry-built platform

Markman: A Film About Jesus: "

EXTERIOR. MEETING AREA.

The crowd is fully assembled, about fifty in all. WATTERS stands holding a Bible on a jerry-built platform.

WATTERS: Corruption, lying, cruelty. These are the signs of these evil times.

Tiger stands in the back, listening.

WATTERS: (cont.) Today the politicians and the criminal elements who run this town appear willing to condone anything. Even murder. And what's worse. The church remains silent.

Tiger moves forward during this speech, but stops dead on "murder". He mutters an EXPLETIVE, turns and heads back into parking area.

REX carries his sign up to the platform.

REX: Let's hear it for John Watters.

WATTERS stops Rex.

WATTERS: No. (Beat) We need repentance, not adulation. We need to turn things around. (points to his heart) In here.

WATTERS: looks around slowly, taking in the gathering.

WATTERS: (cont.) Come.

He leads his followers into the shallow water by the beach. He hugs each one and blesses them.

They sing a spiritual."

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It is no longer possible for Protestantism to survive in its present form

The Grass Roots Church:

"It is no longer possible for Protestantism to survive in its present form. The present denominational organization of the churches is obsolete. Only a fraction of existing local congregations are equipped to meet the many requirements of the Christian community. And yet, despite the publication of countless criticisms of the Church in our time, no one has offered a constructive alternative to present patterns. This book is intended for those who have a sense of the criticisms, or at least see the deficiencies, and are ready to participate in a positive movement for the renewal of the Church."

'via Blog this'

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Sprawl and Decline Are Synonymous

Sprawl Apocalypse - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Sprawl and Decline Are Synonymous Because Density is Required for a Viable Future Economy and Urban Trumps Sprawl and the Economic Burdens of Home Ownership and Commuting Will Be Unbearable"



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Stop building separated structures

Beyond Pattern Language: Where uniformity meets redemptive disorder:

"Stop building separated structures
Create an eco matrix that handles everything that moves water waste currents and so forth
Connect to this lego-blocks aka spaces
Aka living units aka rooms
Aka safe spots
These are also mass produced but like today's cars
They are customized in a zillion ways
Construction is no longer sprawl
It uses pattern language principles
To create car free zones
Car free cyber-communities"

'via Blog this'

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Why Star Wars Is Right

Abba's Way:

"To call Abba the force is better sense
Than tomes of doctrine, indefensible.
I knew a tiny remnant would see true,
I knew the tempting way would be the rule.
I knew the fickle ways of swaying crowds,
Their other-worldly superstition too.
See now the texts that join all texts extant,
Creating religion in place of truth ..."

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Scientific life is highly and essentially idealistic

Joseph Ransdell, "Sciences as Communicational Communities" at ARISBE: THE PEIRCE GATEWAY:

"Scientific life is highly and essentially idealistic, and its attractiveness as a human activity is due at least as much to this as to its technological productivity. People outside of the sciences already understand quite well that science is highly profitable on the technological side, which is why they support it even when they understand little of what it is really like. What they do not understand is that its success is not due to magically powerful but essentially mechanical techniques of grinding out results--this is, unfortunately, the common view of it--but rather to devotion to the adventurous and chance-taking spirit, informed by commitment to turning failure to success by treating mistakes as opportunities to correct one's course rather than as signs of defeat or incompetence. "

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Fallibility is our default condition

Fallibility - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"Fallibility is Our Default. Each Try We Make is Never the Final One. There is No End. Fallibility is Our Admission that We Live by Hope, Experiment and Gradual Progress"

More meandering notions at the link above.

Science suffers from its captivity to corporations, universities and narcissism



"...scientific publication as communication ... entails first of all that everything said about the subject-matter should be said responsibly and sincerely, which is to say that lying, misdirection, evasion, waffling, and all other forms of deliberate or tolerated misrepresentation--in short, any of the many forms of insincerity--are the most fundamental of all violations of scientific method. Secrecy is a limitation on science: where secrecy begins science ends, strictly speaking; but that is a limitation on the scope of inclusion of a scientific community, and although necessarily crippling to whatever extent it is practiced, it is not secrecy but rather insincerity--lying in its most general form--that kills science immediately insofar as it enters into it effectively. Why? Because no real subject-matter can be understood from the perspective of a single person--reality has facets--but is essentially a matter of the coordination of multiple perspectives on the same thing, and lying introduces pseudo-perspectives that tend toward defeating attempts within a scientific community to establish a coherent coordination of the perspectives available at a given time, thus deracinating inquiry by destroying the integrity of its connection with its subject-matter as its ultimate source of control ..." - Joseph Ransdell  
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RECCMENDATION Richard Gordon Quantum Touch

The Slow as Molasses Press