We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Saturday, August 28, 2021

Posts that I especially recommend for Saturday, August 28, 2021

Note: I am planning a first road trip to the US east coast probably immediately after Labor Day, September 6, from my home in southern Minnesota. (Most of my adult life was on the west coast.) If any of you regular followers would like to meet me on this road trip, I will try to accommodate you in my itinerary. The arrangement would at least consist of meeting over a beverage of your choice at a location near you or at your home. Please contact me if this interests you at my email address: goatmeal36@yahoo.com. Ron H.

Can we stop pretending that wars of aggression justified under false pretext, and fought at the behest of corporate interests are in any way spreading ‘freedom and democracy’ around the globe? Do people really still believe that? Surely you jest. It is purely a nationalist fantasy.
 
But there are many other fantasies as well communicated via the corporate media that we are only beginning to question. Just as the contrived 9/11 event launched wars shortly thereafter in Afghanistan and Iraq, we are being played (manipulated) once again with the corona pandemic propaganda.
  • Watch live as news breaks: Parole board to release Kennedy 'assassin' featuring Rick Sanchez interviewing a lawyer who reports the latest parole hearing of Sirhan Sirhan via RT's channel on YouTube. My reaction: This is another example of how the CIA, the highly secretive agency of the ruling class and the latter's mainstream media, have played (manipulated) ordinary Americans nearly 60 years ago. Neither Sanchez, the interviewed lawyer and the remaining Kennedy family believe that Sirhan Sirhan was guilty of the assassination of Robert Kennedy. This event was after the CIA murdered Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, numerous Black Panthers, and his brother, John F. Kennedy, the president of our country. It looks like the American people will never learn about how they are being manipulated by media corporations.
  • Love Your Servitude - Aldous Huxley & George Orwell from After Skool. My reaction: I noticed at 04:54m that the speaker referred to the Chinese techniques as "brainwashing". But this story was only propaganda to cover for the US's use of biowarfare. Since WWII we have learned from various historians (censored by mainstream institutions) that we have been fed propaganda stories about the 1930s and WWII and thereafter. Read my essays here and here for the general truth about these subjects.
Aldous Huxley (26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) was an English writer and philosopher. He wrote nearly fifty books both novels and non-fiction works—as well as wide-ranging essays, narratives, and poems. In his most famous novel Brave New World (1932) and his final novel Island (1962), he presented his vision of dystopia and utopia, respectively.

George Orwell, was an English novelist, essayist, journalist and critic. His work is characterised by lucid prose, biting social criticism, opposition to totalitarianism and mass surveillance. As a writer, Orwell produced literary criticism and poetry, fiction and polemical journalism; and is best known for the allegorical novella Animal Farm (1945) and the dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949).

The profound animation from 12:30 to 15:45 of this video is from "IN-SHADOW - A Modern Odyssey - Animated Short Film" by Lubomir Arsov

The full Aldous Huxley audio us from his lecture at UC Berkeley in 1962. 
  • Did China abandon socialism? by Philip Roddis from his weblog SteelCityScribblings. My reaction: As a committed real socialist this article is encouraging, but I still worry.
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