Hot tips, points and runaways

What's the point in writing this blog? What was the point of the little local protest today?

The point is that we fear for the future and we have to live with our own consciences. It might not be our future, we might be dead by the time the really nasty shit hits the fan, but we do have to live daily with our conscience.

The more we learn about global warming, the scarier it looks, the more uneasy we feel. There appear to be tipping points that may precipitate run-away effects and points of no return. Here you can find the top ten that may cause extinctions. Here's where you can find a shorter list and links to pretty pictures that point to a disturbing future. And here is where you can find some more information along with video.

The very base of the ocean food chain, phytoplankton, is decreasing at a steady rate. If you think about it, it's scary. Read about it here.

This was a really good panel. They don't all see things in the same light, but they're all smart guys.

You can watch it here, but that's the beginning and it's the end of the discussion that gets really good.

too big to fail

I'm watching Andrew Ross Sorkin, author of Too Big to Fail on Booktv, c-span2. It was recorded 11/2/09 and it's good stuff, watch it.

Can institutions be too big to fail? There is some debate. All I know is that free-market fundamentalism is economic anarchy. George Soros thinks so too and he put his money where his mouth is. For some people, it's a moral issue.

Good thing Dubai is a relatively small. We may be saying, bye bye to Dubai.

Too bad it might be a sign as to our own commercial real estate markets.

conflated faiths

Do you have faith in science, god, religion, myth or all of the above? Can you differentiate between those items?

A recent poll reveals that about half of scientists believe in god or a higher power while 95% of Americans are believers.

One could draw conclusions. Science erodes religious faith. The pressures of social conformity and unresolved existential angst are roughly equivalent to rational tendencies for agnosticism, atheism and rejection of faith.

My conclusion is that we haven't differentiated these issues and they will remain conflated within our cultures for many generations. Heck, hardly anyone even knows what a mythicist or such a position is and the process of differentiating spirituality and religion has just begun.

our defining moment

It looks like we're missing our window and the climate change situation is as bad as we feared.

IPCC chairman Rajendra Pachauri said at the time, "If there's no action before 2012, that's too late. What we do in the next two to three years will determine our future. This is the defining moment." You can read the official story here.

With the economy, the wars, and the health care debate raging, there's little chance that there will be adequate attention or action to avert disaster.

One in four (25%) of American mortgage borrowers are under water now, but in a geologic blink of an eye there will be a lot more people with their homes under some very real water and billions will have almost no water at all.

Can We Survive? It's a question I think of often and now I'm wondering why the authors chose to state that the skills we need are on the verge of extinction....
"Part of the solution is to create and deploy what we have called “first-round survival technologies.” However, our current system of technology development discourages this; moreover, the entire category of skills required to create such multidisciplinary innovations is on the verge of extinction. "

The Right is Wrong

The Right is wrong, or so we progressives think. Here's what some neuroscience reveals. Yeah, it's not too revealing other than demonstrating that conservatives are more stubborn. Is one side more sophisticated, morally or intellectually? Most of us know that academia has traditionally been dominated by liberals. Perhaps it's just the workplace and relative income.

Inequality

The distribution of wealth has always been a contentious issue, not only in this country, but throughout history. Today's super-rich are far richer than those of the past. Note the graphs in wikipedia. The top 5% aren't included because it doesn't fit. The L-Curve puts it a little better perspective.

It's obscene. It's heresy in the spirit of religions and an affront to secular ethics and morality, but it was all Perfectly Legal. You can view the man here and here. We are living in the golden age of greed. I think that non-profit is a higher ethic than profit motive. Perhaps someday we will evolve beyond capitalism and live the Star Trek dream, but I doubt any of us will be around to see that day, unless 2012 really does bring an end of the world as we know it and destroys this new world order to replace it with economic democracy. It's up to us to make it so.

The truth is that inequality creates a host of problems; poorer physical and mental health, poorer education, more drug abuse, more imprisonment, less social mobility (though that may seem counter-intuitive), etc. Inequality is increasing, here in the USA and around the globe. The reason that we are witnessing the death of the middle class is pretty simple, tax structures. After the Great Depression, the tax rates on our nations richest was around 90%, but they still got filthy rich. Today their tax burden is less than one-third of that.

People in this country freak-out about taxes. That's because the rich can afford such great PR and they own the mass media. It's a crying shame that would make the Founding Fathers weep in their graves.

Anyways, you might want to check-out this mother-drucker.

One way to reverse this bad trend is to reclaim democracy. I doubt we need a course in ultimate civics, exercising the basics should be good enough. Another thing you can do is educate each other, use this great technology while we can. Be your brothers keeper.

who owns the news

Mass media is not what our Founding Fathers hoped for, but might be the sort of thing that they feared. Take a look here and get a glimpse of who owns what. Some people want to take it back. If you'd like to know more about your own back yard, try this.

Why should you care? Because good journalism and a well informed public could prevent unjust wars based on lies, or may have prevented the Wall Street Gang from blackmailing the taxpayers for a trillion dollars. We were warned, but nobody listened.

So far, you've had a glimpse of the companies, but what about the people? What about the interlocking directorate and why is it important? Because they rule. The CFR is a pretty scary organization if you ask me or some other people.

It's a damn kleptocracy, but we're doing pretty good if you look at the bigger picture. We can do better though.

Pay or Die

I sure wish I had some decent health care. I don't earn enough to buy into our present pay or die system.
Here's an interesting link about health care systems from around the world. It's not too hard to correlate the data with world rankings. I'd make it easier, but I am a bit of a cybertard.

Sometimes I wonder...are we too stupid or arrogant to learn from the rest of the world? But I know it's not that simple.

The Nobel Prize winner says, Reform or Else.
I couldn't agree more, I'm uninsured and getting older every moment.

There are supposedly 45,000 people that die each year from health problems because they are uninsured or under insured or because they have insurance plans or HMOs that just plain suck. Some people are getting divorced because they can get their children covered as single parents when they cannot as a married couple. It's crazy.

Some indifferent jerks argue that no one in this country is denied health care because emergency rooms take everybody. As if there's no difference between preventive care and trauma.

If we had universal health care like all the other developed nations do, our business sector would no longer carry the burden of the costs of health care. Wouldn't it be nice to get the economy back on track? One of the big reasons that the US auto manufactures are failing to compete in the global marketplace is that they pay for the health care of the laborers unlike all of the competing countries (many of which also subsidize the manufactures).

Any one who owns a business, especially those with employees, should be an advocate for universal health care. Unfortunately, what should be is quite different from what is and those with the most money have the loudest voices while the courts condone corporate lies. Okay, so that's wild hyperbole, but I remember the days when there were truth in advertising laws.

Meanwhile, CEOs like Steven Hensley of United Healthcare are being "compensated" 700 million dollars for their services. It's obscene and immoral. How many need to die so a few can be filthy rich?

Positive Crap

It's been bothering me for years now and I'm happy to see that there are others, more eloquent than I, who have shared their perspectives.

Stuart Davis produced a fun piece, The Secret: The Spirituality of Narcissism. I do get tired of the remedial use of the AQAL model though. Personally, I like all the pretty images.

And I sure would like to get my hands on Barbara Ehrenreich's new book, Bright-Sided which you can read and listen to a bit of if you so choose. Or, you could watch a little video on the subject.

Uncounted

I'm watching another reminder of what I feared. Uncounted: The New Math of American Elections is another must-see for any and all Americans who have good faith in our electoral system.

It makes me wonder what the real vote counts were in the last big election. I also wonder how the good people of black-box are doing.

It's the money, stupid

Money may not be the root of all evil, but it sure is at the heart of most of our most pressing problems. It's big money that has corrupted our political system. It's big money that has undermined the legitimacy of our media. It's big money that has us locked into fossil fuel dependence and unsustainable economy. It's the money that leaves us with one of the worst health care systems in the developed world. It's big money that has corrupted our hearts and minds.

Don't take my word for that though, listen to the confessions of an economic hit man.

The problem is that there is no upper limit to the accumulation of so called wealth. It's obscene, but there are some who believe in responsible wealth. Who really holds the wealth? Check this out. I found the bottom of the page to be particularly interesting.

It was only about fifty years ago that the highest tax bracket was about 90%. President Reagan accelerated the big change leading us away from the golden age of the middle class and it was all perfectly legal. You can hear it from a Pulitzer-prize winner if you don't believe me.

Who are all of these super-rich fat cats creating an ugly new world order? Ask Daniel.

If you haven't seen The Obama Deception, just click. If you'd like something on the lighter side, try some Steven Colbert.

Oh yeah, if the conspiracy stuff disturbs you...try to remember that the solution to the problem is to create healthy democratic institutions. A government Of, By and For The People may still be a dream, a dream that too many people have died for, but it's still our dream. We also might want to remember that this is not only an American dream, but a global dream. If we build it, will they come?

Perhaps the reason that we can't get our economic house in order and have to put Wall Street ahead of Main Street is that we can't afford the possibility of capital flight. Too bad Joe couldn't be a little more candid about it. I'd throw in another Colbert Report link, but it's not posted yet.

divorced from truth

There was a story on Good Morning America or perhaps it was the Today show about a couple who became divorced so they could afford health care for their daughter. As a single mother the mother qualified for subsidies and was able to provide health services for the daughter. One of the hosts commented that she hoped that congressional representatives saw the story. So it seems that the present healthcare system is anti-family.

I doubt that the story would affect many of our legislators, much if any. Those who are opposed to real and meaningful reforms (Republicans and Blue-dog Democrats) are working for the special interests that fund and bribe them, not The People.

Bribery may seem slanderous or over-the-top, but that's just my old-fashioned conservative side slipping out. For the first 150 years since our country was founded, it was strictly prohibited for any business to contribute to any political campaign and the practice of lobbying was also illegal. It wasn't until 1886 that corporations began to usurp the rights written into the Bill of Rights, rights designed for people, not institutions. In 1935 big business made more headway and in the 1950's, things really began to unravel.

So now perhaps you see, money from business to politics was considered bribery and was illegal for half of our country's history. It has been said, power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. Who has any doubt that money is powerful?

It makes me wonder and I hope you too, just whose land is this?

The Republicans and Blue-dogs aren't fooling me. I'm not falling for the fear-mongering cries of socialism and government take-overs. I know they don't give a damn about about you, me, family or the lives of the unborn. All they care about is political gamesmanship and all of the money. Yeah it's hard to know what's true, but there are those who watch with prudent discrimination and follow the money.

I cant help it, I'm just an old-fashioned, conservative patriot.

Dollars for cents

Why would a person spend millions of dollars to land a job that only pays thousands?
That's a question that has been troubling me for years, maybe decades.

Mayor Bloomberg recently spent more than 85 million dollars to win his job that should pay $195,000 but the magnanimous billionaire is only accepting one dollar for his labor. Huh? Why?

Self-financed campaigns are nothing new, but it's a growing trend. It's all so confusing now that I don't even know what a fair election could be. Let's just hope that we have the best democracy that money can buy.

Moore's Law, less work

Moore's Law means less work. Okay, not really, but I thought that it would be a catchy title and was an easy way for me to remember the gist of this theme.

Computer power roughly doubles every eighteen months. Machines and software programs are displacing labor. In recent history we have seen several jobless economic recoveries. Productivity rises along with un- and under- employment. It's nothing new, ever since the industrial revolution and even somewhat before, human labor has been displaced with technology. It's just more of a crisis now than before.

What will be the future of work? Paul Krugman reports that the Fed expects the unemployment to remain about 8% until 2012. Krugman recommends "a small-scale version of the New Deal’s Works Progress Administration, one that would offer relatively low-paying (but much better than nothing) public-service employment".

Phases in Stages

I happen to think that there are phases within stages. My view is pretty simple. Each stage begins with a learning phase when one learns the rules. I refer to this as the fundamentalist phase. Next is the competence phase. The last phase is the exit phase.

Most of you probably don't have a clue as to what I'm referring to so here's a little background..

I'm one of those annoying psychology buffs and I think everyone should be familiar with developmental psychology. I was introduced as a college freshman and really loved the experiments and conclusions of Jean Piaget. I didn't get a degree in psychology, but my interests in sociology and psychology have remained.

Several years ago I became enthused with the works of Ken Wilber and was really into the whole integral scene. I later found myself rather disillusioned, but it did have a lasting affect to my personal philosophy. Today I like to describe myself as post-integral, at least to those familiar with that context. But that's all a long story in itself, I'll get back to the point of this blog now.

Spiral Dynamics offers an interesting perspective of developmental theory. I tend to agree with the criticisms of Michel Bauwens and Chris Cowan, but that's still a little off-subject so I'll circle back to the beginning.

Each stage of the Spiral Dynamics model can easily be divided into three phases:

In the beginning phase the person is basically a fundamentalist zealot wherein one is preoccupied with learning and mastering the view of the stage. There is no room for contrary views and the authority(ies) on the matter reign supreme. Any challenge to the perspective is considered heresy as it threatens to undermine to mental construct that requires great effort to build.

The second phase is relative competence and the rigid view is loosened to allow for critical thinking to be applied to the perspective. Strict literalism and dogmatism loosen to allow for more metaphorical interpetations as identification with the stage is firmly established to the point where contrary views are no longer threatening.

The third phase is mastery of the present stage along with the emergence of the next stage where one begins to appreciate the limits of the present level. The truths of the stage can now be seen as relative and valid criticism may be incorporated. The view is no longer the exclusive perspective and intellectual sense of identity.

Spiritual, not Religious

Karl Marx stated that religion is the opiate of the masses. so I ask....will you fill-in the blank?

If religion is the opiate of the masses then spirituality is the __________ of society.

It is becoming more common for people to make the distinction between spiritual and religious, about 20% of the population here in the USA describe themselves as spiritual, not religious. It is a distinction that I think is extremely important so the baby doesn't get thrown out with the bathwater. It is difficult for people to agree to a common definition of spirituality. I tend to think of spirituality as that which is most meaningful and valuable to us.

I happen to be an anti-fundamentalist. Fundamentalists come in a wide variety; religious, secular and ideological. I think fundamentalism is a phase. Unfortunately, there is the possibility of arrested development.

As far as religious fundamentalism goes, I'm in favor of anything that loosens the hold of rigid beliefs. It's why I like the writings of Daniel Quinn, Dan Brown, Zacharia Sitchen and productions like Zeitgiest, (which they're attempting to make into a movement) and Ancient Aliens. I remember watching Chariots of the Gods when I was a kid, it was soooo cool. Who knows, they may still be here. Some people think they know what they saw.
You can join the extra campaign if you'd like to try to let the ET cat out of the bag.

I don't think that many people have a thorough understanding of what religion really is. Religion is far more complex than that superficial definition. This entry is more comprehensive. Religion has historical components, political components, philosophical components, astronomical components, mythological components and more.

Looking deeper into matters is part of what I consider spirituality to be. When I think about humanity's roots, I reflect back through the corridors of time and evolution, a time before we had a written language, when we migrated from the true motherland. It is a time we can glimpse into with diamond vision and the disciplines of archeology, astro-archeology and myth.

Pushing farther back the roads of evolution and reforming a corrupted Darwinian view , I am filled with awe and love, love which extends to the dogs, cats, flowers, trees, fish and bees. It is a love of sublime mystery.

Part of religion is history, the history of ancient astronauts interacting with humanity.
Part of religion is political manipulation of holy text, a patriarchal agenda due to violence induced by accumulations of resources by agrarian culture. See Elaine Reisler, the Chalice and the Blade.
Part of religion is misinterpretation of fossil records. T-rex must have been a giant (human).

Worm your way to health

It has been said that cleanliness is next to godliness, yet we all have to eat a spoonful of dirt before we die. It's a symbiotic biosphere, so Check this out.

corporate cover-ups

ABC news ran a short story this morning about Senator John Rockefeller's investigation into the percentages of healthcare insurance premiums that go to paying medical costs. You can read about that yourself. What concerns me more is the story behind the story which is much larger and far more important.

The greater story is how corporations are able to shield themselves from federal oversight and inquiry. The insurance companies were able to refuse to supply the senator with documents citing that it is proprietary information. Corporations are issued charters by the states in which they conduct business. The state is to outline the conditions by which a company must comply for the privilege of doing business.

The story is simply another example of how we live in a corporatocracy with a veneer of democracy and how justice has taken a back seat to the manipulations of monied law.

The corporate personhood debate is much like the climate change debate. It's only a debate because obscenely rich special interests fund mis- and dis- information campaigns.

See Steven Colbert's take on the matter, he's funny.

Help to reclaim our democracy and end the doctrine of corporate personhood. Here's where you can take a little action.