National Debt
The news that the Swiss are juggling with the idea of granting everyone of their citizens a guaranteed £2800 a month income shows how different our culture is, it also emulates the past stories of how Iceland and other countries ousted the Rothschild-owned banks & IMF; allowing their people to take direct control over their prosperity, and ending the unnecessary culture of debt.
That’s what we plan to-do as a nation, when we get enough people behind the idea of a truly-democratic People’s Parliament.
We don’t aim to become another political party that falls into the damaged machine of Westminster; we aim to be the collective will of the entire nation, representing all walks of life, and not just one specific group.
Our first aim will be to pull all financial institutions in the country under FULL public ownership, and to reclaim the stolen finances of every taxpayer.
We will put an end to the culture & idea known as debt. Money has no real value, therefore debt is imaginary, and thus it holds no true power over us.
New ideas for prosperity will be encouraged, and will lead to structuring society based on a new paradigm where we support each other.
The idea of class will be erased as the population and the new People’s Parliament will become one and the same; the collective heart of the entire nation.
With the end of control over the economy, the global banks and corporations will no longer have the power nor influence to start wars, conduct genocide, nor create anymore famine etc.
Money will cease to be a controlling factor in the world.
Humanity will take preference, and will lead the nation (and eventually the world) into building a brighter and fairer future for all.
The People’s Parliament is worth looking into but what drew me to this passage was the line about the ‘unnecessary culture of debt’. I’d heard on the radio last night something about how the UK is more in debt per head of population that any other country. I thought it sounds dire but was left wondering what it meant. Economics upsets me but I need to look into it if I am to converse about politics with any semblance of credibility. There’s a cool interactive graphic on the BBC News website.
This is worth comparing with the article on debt in the False Economy website. See also Economics Help. I want to look at these articles a bit more when I have time.
The Big Bang Theory
I think ‘the big bang theory’, is hilarious and cute .. the last episode was particularly cute. It featured the guys pairing up for a scavenger hunt competition organised by Raj. Howard and Amy bonded in a way that would be worrying if it was a different kind of show but Penny and Sheldon stole the show as a kind of dynamic duo that might work as a detective show spin-off … ‘he was the nerdy genius professor, she was the sexy intuitive waitress .. together they fight crime.’
Some more interesting pairings can be generated here: http://paulm.com/toys/they_fight_crime.html and here: http://www.williamswriting.com/fantasy-protagonists-generator/
Alan Watts on Buddhism
Prayer
Abwoon d’bwashmaya (Our Father which art in heaven)
Father-Mother of the Universe. Source of All that Is,
Nethqadash shmakh (Hallowed be thy name)
May we within our inner shrines of prayer and meditation honour the sacred resonance of your Name.
Teytey malkuthakh (Thy kingdom come)
May we come to live in full awareness of your Presence.
Nehwey tzevyanach aykanna d’bwahmaya aph b’arha (Thy Will be done in earth, as it is in heaven)
May this realm of the physical become imbued with Consciousness and Light.
Hawvlan lachma d’sunqanan yaomana (Give us this day our daily bread)
May we receive that which we need so that Life and Light and Love persist and grow within us.
Wahboqlan khaubayn (wakhtahayn) aykanna daph khnan shbwoqan
l’khayyabayn (And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors)
May we be released from the guilt and shame that we suffer for past misdeeds even as we release others from our condemnation of their misdeeds.
Wela tahlan l’nesyuna
Ela patzan min bisha (And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil)
May we be led from worlds of delusion, darkness and despair to the paths of life and light and love.
Metol dilakhie malkutha wahayla wateshbukhta l’ahlam almin.
Ameyn. (For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.)
Ground of our Being. The Particular and All. The Beginning, Middle and End. Sacred, Sacred, Sacred.
Amen. Amen. Amen.
I found this meditation on the Lord’s Prayer here. It is from Prayers of the Cosmos: Meditations on the Aramaic Words of Jesus by Neil Douglas-Klotz.
I was inspired to do my own meditation/variant on the words:
Father-Mother of the Universe. Source of All that Is,
May we within our inner shrines of prayer and meditation honour the sacred resonance of your Name.
May we come to live in full awareness of your Presence.
May this realm of the physical become imbued with Consciousness and Light.
May we receive that which we need so that Life and Light and Love persist and grow within us.
May we be released from the guilt and shame and fear we suffer for past misdeeds even as we release our condemnation of others.
May we be led from worlds of delusion, darkness and despair to the paths of life and light and love.
Ground of our Being. The Particular and All. The Beginning, Middle and End. Sacred, Sacred, Sacred.
Amen. Amen. Amen.
Interesting Contrast
Sandy’s hair and my beard make an interesting contrast … also I don’t look too fat in this one. Sandy and I also make an interesting contrast but it works.
Education and Technology
Edudemic is an interesting looking site – ‘connecting education and technology’ as its subtitle says. Interesting for me because these are my twin creative/professional interests.
I found the link on a post by Adelina Silva on her scoop.it site which is also about education and technology.
Statins: The Greatest Medical Fraud?
I have been hearing negative things about statins for a long time. I gave up taking them about five years ago. I also gave up taking blood pressure tablets a year or so later. I not going to say that my rationale for going off medication was based on research or any deep knowledge of hypertension or high cholesterol but I believe that lifestyle choices can have a more profound effect on health than medication which, I also believe, have harmful effects that doctors try to counter with more medication. While I have not made the lifestyle choices that I should have made I think that my decision to go off the medication was still the right one.
An article on Waking Times cites what looks like a major report on a number of studies on the effects of statins. The report says that:
“The statin industry, with all of its spin-off(s), is a 20-billion-a-year industry. We are observing the revealing of the utmost medical tragedy of all times. It is unprecedented that the healthcare industry has inadvertently induced life-threatening nutrient deficiency in millions of otherwise healthy people.[1]”
The article is well worth reading. Because the medical profession is perceived as competent and as generally good a great deal of good its pronouncements and recommendations are accepted uncritically by most of us even when we are presented with strong evidence that those pronouncements and recommendations are wrong.
I’ve uploaded the cited article here: The Ugly Side of Statins. Systemic Appraisal of the Contemporary Un-Known Unknowns*
See also:
Banning the Veil
I wrote the following in response to a couple of online articles, here and here, about banning the veil:
The burka and niqab change the nature of social interactions and are expressions of a philosophy or mindset that is antithetical to individual freedom and social cohesion. The face mask is anti human and anti community. It is not a part of Islam but is a cultural phenomenon that expresses values similar to thosethat drive female genital mutilation. Islam asks only for modesty and the hijab is an honourable and sufficient expression of devotion. Fully covering the face and body in public should be considered as unacceptable as fully uncovering the body and both of these extremes are ‘immodest’ if modesty is defined as a ‘disinclination to call attention to oneself’.
We either want a society based on a perception of shared humanity or we want one where identities such as race, gender, caste, religion, class, sexuality etc. take precedence over common identities as human beings and citizens and define who we are and how we relate as humans and as citizens.
One of the most touching comments I’ve heard about the veil and its banning was that of a French Muslim girl who said that her country had protected her when her family did not.
Two Weekends
We’re back from a weekend trip (Friday to Sunday) to Euro Disney in Paris. Sandy, Xavier and the others enjoyed it and I enjoyed seeing them enjoy it. Euro Disney is very popular and there were a lot of people who obviously enjoyed it. If you like Mickey Mouse and Disney Films and pink storybook castles you will enjoy it. The hotel was very nice. The fireworks were spectacular. It was most definitely a once in a lifetime experience.
This was the second of two weekend trips. The first was on the previous weekend 14th to 16th September when Sandy and I went on a DFDS ferry ‘cruise’ from Harwich to Esbjerg in Denmark. Both of us would agree that the cruise was far from enjoyable and was essentially a trip from nowhere to nowhere. I could say more but there is no point wasting more time and energy over it.