VAI

In the book 1984 by George Orwell, the state uses "Doublethink" to consolidate its power.  Simply put Doublethink is the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.

Do you agree with the United Nations Convention Against Torture, that:..."any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him" is torture and illegal.

When you hear that the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques" is OK and helps save lives do you agree? 

Doublethink means business.  You can be against torture, but it can be ok in some circumstances, and better still while a doctor's supervision. 

 

The main character in 1984, was Winston Smith, who worked as a clerk in the Records Department of the Ministry of Truth, where his job was to rewrite historical documents so they matched the constantly changing current party line.

Don't be a victim of Doublethink.  Enhanced interrogation techniques is doublethink for torture.  Call it what it is.  And torture is wrong.  Period.  The ends do not justify the means.  It is self defeating and an affront to human dignity.  And what if it was you on the rack, as Winston Smith found out for himself in 1984.

At one minute past midnight on May 20, Missouri executes Dennis Skillicorn, after the Governor denies clemency.  

Skillicorn was convicted for his part in a murder in 1994.  He had become a model inmate while in prison.  He died by lethal injection after numerous delays in the sentence due to the debate that the Missouri 3 drug technique and its application was cruel and unusual punishment.   It is the first execution in Missouri in nearly 4 years.

So justice is served in Missouri, the show me state. 

Murder is a heinous crime.  In the words of the Savior, if you do it to the lest of mine, you do it to me. 

At the heart of our financial crisis, or any major crisis, is the fact that we were doing something really wrong to cause it and turn it into a full blow crisis.

 

This financial crisis and meltdown is rooted in a greedy love of money.  Wall Street, whoever that is, spends its time accumulating and securing vast pools of wealth, for no real purpose other than it can.  These forces hire the smartest people, in their pursuit of wealth for wealth's sake.  There is no plan for using it, no improvement in the welfare of society or the standard of living of earth's citizens, except of course for a very small group.  I read that 500 people on earth have more money than the bottom 500 million folks.  Does this make sense.  As JD Rockefeller knows now, you sure can't take it with you.  And what is the point of money if it does not do anything, create things and make life better. 

So I am in favor of a new world of finance.  It starts with ethical banking.  Simply put, ethical banking  concerned with the social and environmental impacts of its investments and loans. Moreover, how does its practices impact its world and the people that live there. 

It is time to move beyond this idea that money for the sake of money is a fashionable goal.  That you can use whatever means possible to enrich yourself, to the detriment of others is a worn out idea.

We need to tap the human potential, and encourage it to grow.  There can be enough for everyone.  We just have to stop and think about what is important, what you want to spend you short life doing and then things make more sense.  IN this case if we all begin to call for Ethical Banking Practices for all.  It might just become a reality one dayto go around. People do much better when they can do more than struggle every day to survive.

Come on, money is the tool for everyone's betterment, not just the privilege of just a self perpetuating few.   And you can't take it with you when you leave this earth.  That's the facts.  So put the idea of  Ethical Banking into your after crisis thinking and discussions.  It does not have to be like this again.

Being mindful or practicing mindfulness is an ancient art.  Simply put; it is being in the moment.  Being aware of your thoughts and actions.    It is a technique that has been taught and practiced for thousands of years, all over the world.  Being in the moment enables one to see with more clarity.

I had such a moment this weekend thanks to the bees.   I watched Mr Phillips, an old bee veteran, show a group of us newbie beekeepers how to install our new bees into our hives.  We were all decked out in our new protective gear, as we watched Mr. Phillips demonstrate how to install 15,000 bees into a hive.  Then I became mindful of all 50 years of being "afraid" of bees, and how the sound of bees around your head, even with protective gear, still made me nervous. 

Mr Phillips wore no protective gear at all, as he performed the task.  He was simply in the moment, doing something he had obviously done countless times before. 

Then I became mindful of all these thoughts, and I found all my fears and misconception began to disappear and I became enthralled with watching this process of nature that I had never witnessed before, but was now privelged and mindful of doing.  And I was starting a new journey of being a novice beekeeper.  And I will bee mindful, especailly as I learn the ropes.

  Who would have thought that possible.

Beware Caesar, the Ides of March, said the blind soothsayer.

It was today March 15 that Julius Caesar was assassinated by a group of aristocratic Roman Senators, who thought of themselves as saviors of the Republic. They feared the end of the Republic and feared a tyranny by Caesar.  The final blow was stuck by Caesar's good friend Brutus, and the famous words via Shakespeare: Et tu Brute? ( And you Brutus) "Then Fall Caesar",  were spoken.  Ironically their action and Caesar's death, lead directly to the end of the Roman Republic and the Reign of Octavian.

You Too Brutus? 

Friends are an important part of everyone's life. 

For better and worse.

Think out of the box.

I am tired of all the talk of our world, as we know it, ending.  Banks closing, unemployment, foreclosures, etc... Our system and our way of living is way overdue for a correction and a re ordering of our priorities in life. Is making money the only measure for living a successful life? 

Come on.  You can't take it with you now can you?  Just ask Rockefeller.

Let's change gears.  Let's change our thinking, let's think out of our box.  Even our earth.  And maybe there is more going on than just us.

A new scientific analysis that suggests there could be hundreds, even thousands, of intelligent civilizations in the Milky way.

Researchers at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland constructed a computer model to create a synthetic galaxy with billions of stars and planets. They then studied how life evolved under various conditions in this virtual world, using a supercomputer to crunch the results.

In a paper published recently in the International Journal of Astrobiology, the researchers concluded that based on what they saw, at least 361 intelligent civilizations have emerged in the Milky Way since its creation, and as many as 38,000 may have formed.

So it is always a good thing to broaden your perspective and your thinking? 

I wondering how their economy is doing?  Or do they even have or need one?

Think out of the box, folks.

 

 

It was history in the making as I watched our new president take the oath of office.  It has been a long time since I felt good about America and our system of government.  And no matter what transpires in the days and months ahead, I do have a new feeling of hope for the future.  Things change, and we are all watching change before our eyes, like it or not.  Things are changing.

I extend my congratulations and best wishes to our new President as we all move into the future together, and leave the past behind.

Everything is always changing.   Nothing lasts forever.  That is a law of nature, and that is what makes life so engaging.  As the old saying goes, you can never jump into the same ocean twice.

Today is Martin Luther King Day.  It is now an official national holiday.  Government offices are closed, no mail is delivered.  Given all that is happening, I thought this image of Rosa Parks getting booked in Montgomery, Alabama is an iconic moment for America and really says it all. 

Rosa Louise McCauley Parks (February 4, 1913 – October 24, 2005) was a civil rights activist whom Congress later called the "Mother of the Modern-Day Civil Rights Movement".

On December 1, 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama, Parks refused to obey bus driver James Blake's order that she give up her seat to make room for a white passenger.

Parks's act of defiance became an important symbol of the modern Civil Rights Movement and Parks became an international icon of resistance to segregation. She organized and collaborated with civil rights leaders, including Martin Luther King Jr, helping to launch him to national prominence in the civil rights movement.

In her own words Rosa Parks said "People always say that I didn't give up my seat because I was tired, but that isn't true. I was not tired physically, or no more tired than I usually was at the end of a working day. I was not old, although some people have an image of me as being old then. I was forty-two. No, the only tired I was, was tired of giving in".

When Parks refused to give up her seat, a police officer arrested her. As the officer took her away, she recalled that she asked, "Why do you push us around?" The officer's response as she remembered it was, "I don't know, but the law's the law, and you're under arrest." She later said, "I only knew that, as I was being arrested, that it was the very last time that I would ever ride in humiliation of this kind.

We have come a long way since 1955.  And there are many unsung participants that also worked to get us to where we are today.  It will be interesting to see where we are in another 59 years.

Enjoy the holiday.

                    The news is full of Bernie Madoff lately.   

Bernie, a darling of Wall Street, made off with supposedly over $50 Billion dollars of his investors money, in what is now believed to be the largest PONZI SCHEME in history.

A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that involves paying abnormally high returns to investors out of the money paid in by subsequent investors, rather than from the profit from any real business.

It is named after Charles Ponzi.  

The term "Ponzi scheme" is also known as a pyramid scheme.   The original Ponz offered a "50% return in 45 days".

How can you resist an offer like that?  Or is it really too good to be true?

So the Ponzi scheme usually offers abnormally high short-term returns in order to entice new investors. The perpetuation of the high returns that a Ponzi scheme advertises (and pays) requires an ever-increasing flow of money from investors in order to keep the scheme going.  The system is destined to collapse because there are little or no underlying earnings from the money received by the promoter.   The system is destined to collapse because the earnings, if any, are less than the payments. Usually, the scheme is interrupted by legal authorities before it collapses because a Ponzi scheme is suspected or because the promoter is selling unregistered securities. As more investors become involved, the likelihood of the scheme coming to the attention of authorities increases.

And what ultimately was the hook for Bernie Madoff, once you get past all the friends, connections and VIPs that were part of his exclusive Investment Club?  An unbeleivable rate of return of well over 10% return every year that could not be found anywhere else, unless you were lucky enough to be able to give Bernie your money and he invested it for you.

And in the end, the real driver to the success in any Ponzi scheme are the participants.  Folks who just can not pass up an offer that is just too good to be true.  We are sorry that people lost their money.

But as P.T. Barnum said "there is a sucker born every minute".

On a final note, doesn't the current Wall Street meltdown and the selling of valueless credit derivatives sound very similar to a Ponzi scheme, except in this case the government bailed out the schemers and no one is going to jail.

Happy Holidays.  And watch your money in 2009, you are going to need it.

Hello Wilbur, we have lift off, with love, Orville.

It is that ime of year to celebrate and honor of the first manned airplane flight on Dec. 17, 1903, by Orville and Wilbur Wright.  The Wright Brothers.

On this day, at 10:35 AM, on a remote outer banks place in North Carolina, called Kitty Hawk, Orville coaxed the first powered aircraft, off the ground and into flight for 12 seconds and flying a distance of 120 feet.  Later that day Wilbur flew 852 feet in 59 seconds.  The modern era of aviation was born, and our world would never be the same.   Who were these brothers?  They owned a bicycle shop in Dayton, Ohio.  They lacked college degrees.  They were self taught aeronatical engineers, who together built the first heavier than air craft, out of wood, wire and fabric, and got if off the ground in the strong wind, soft sand and seclusion of Kitty Hawk, N.C. on this day in 1903.

It just goes to show what regular people can accomplish, when they have a vision, and are determined to make it work.  Their accomplishments were a pre cursor to a whole new world.  So thanks Wilbur and Orville.  And let's apply a big dose of that good old fashioned American Ingeniuty to getting our great nation off the ground and back into the air in 2009, because "Houston, we have a problem".