Amazing Speech by David Icke

There are just a few pictures I disagree with in this video, most of them are wonderfully chosen. But it’s more about what David Icke says.

Repost: Amusing Ourselves to Death

I have reposted this image from The Citrus Report. I wanted to make this post separate because I wanted to add some comments about it later. I feel the picture makes its point clearly enough. . .

Why Bill Maher was right about Oprah

If you don’t know, Bill Maher posted a video of his criticism of Oprah. Now before you get upset at the idea of someone taking a pot-shot at Oprah, hear me out on this.

Oprah certainly is a nice person, and I believe she tries to do right on her talk show. I mean, who could disagree? Since she gives out so much stuff! Trips to Australia, brand-new cars, iPads. . .

There is something subtler and darker at work here. Bill Maher caught it and bravely (and humorously) pointed it out. He expressed that watching another Oprah audience go ape-shit over getting free stuff was “one of the most disturbing things [he’s] seen on television.” What did he mean by that?

He means that there is more to life than shallow materialism. Our lives are more than the value of our possessions. The things that matter most are the relationships we build, and the love and charity we show to friends and family (and yes, even strangers). You can’t take an iPad with you beyond the grave, but *yes* you can be buried with it (and yes, there is an app for that).

Now, I’m not denying that it’s fine to get pleasure from your stuff. I have an Xbox 360, a nice TV, and I love my computer and the Internet. These things are all great. Let me elaborate a defense of limited materialism. Philosophically, your possessions represent the aggregate of your labors. Since you own your body, and you therefore own your time, you are allowed to give your time to labors that allow you to buy. . . well, stuff. It’s fine to enjoy the fruits of your labor. That’s good, in fact.

What gets excessive is that we begin to start deifying the almighty dollar. Look at shows like Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous and you see an almost pornographic obsession with living in enormously cush homes. It’s all part of that golden American dream: work hard, and you too will one day “make it”. I’m not going to get into the merits of the American Dream.

What I will say is that Bill Maher may be correct in saying that money is the new God. If we somehow manage to join the rich club, then everything will be fine. On the other hand, Leo Rosten was quite correct when he said, “Money can’t buy happiness, but neither can poverty.” So again, I’m not disputing whether a certain level of material comfort is good or bad. It’s definitely good.

But shows like Sweet Sixteen tick me off because they illustrate another example of how the sweat and toil of the laboring classes filter up the pyramid to the richest of the rich. When a son of a producer can be bestowed with a jewel-encrusted jacket and get a new Bemer and that $4,000 specialty off-roading bike that he absolutely must get to know his parents love him (and, of course, have P Diddy do a private performance at the party), you have to recognize the essential Ponzi Scheme nature of market capitalism.

There is a mythology at work here. One that seduces people into thinking that the super rich create all the wealth we enjoy. They don’t. To understand this, I’d have to go into an analysis of what really allows our civilization to thrive. Put succinctly, it’s surplus food. This allows specialized labor that produces goods. Viewed this way, you see the success of our modern life is built from the ground up. But, yes, you do need venture capital to build a factory. But you’re better off building a factory in Latin America because American workers cost too much. You can even shut-down an American plant that is still making profits for your corporation (because, hey, you could make more profits somewhere else).

OK, so back from my digression. Why is Oprah’s show disturbing? I admit, it was rather touching when she gave cars to all those people who were struggling to get to work and live life without transportation. That’s all very nice.

But look at things the way Helen Keller would have (the damned socialist); she looked to root causes of social ills rather than slapping a band-aid over a mangled limb and doing high-fives.

Side note here: we all know that Helen Keller was deaf and blind and that she learned to read, write, and communicate because of the extraordinary efforts of a teacher. Teachers love to tell us the story of the water-pump, and how—if Helen Keller could overcome adversity—gosh darn it, we can too. Then they move onto the next subject without talking about the sordid details of what Helen Keller did when she grew up: she became a socialist. The admiring public turned against her and decided that she was being manipulated by her “handlers”.

You know an event that led Helen Keller to socialism? She grew up to advocate for proper education of the blind, and she discovered that blindness disproportionately affected poor people. This had to do with the fact that if you were poor you were more likely to be born of a Syphilitic mother. That’s when she recognized that being poor kinda sucked and became a Socialist. Remember, root causes.

So when Oprah gives shit away and the crowd goes wild and the viewers shed that single conceited tear, realize that Oprah is just slapping a band-aid on a festering wound and basking in the warm glow of a proper do-gooder. She doesn’t use her considerable influence to highlight why people need cars so badly to get to work and can’t afford them. She doesn’t deal with root causes, but she’s busy doing the Mexican hat-dance when she gives out iPads like she just solved every problem in the universe; as if life will somehow get better because they can go home with another expensive toy.

Bill Maher caught on to this; and I, for one, think he’s right.

© David Metcalf

A Return to Lex Talonis

Every Sunday, millions of Christian’s recite the Lord’s Prayer. They call upon God to “forgive us our trespasses, just as we forgive those who trespass against us.” Being raised Grace Lutheran, I wonder if these words hold any sway over American Christians anymore.

It is striking when the death of Osama bin Laden leads to jubilant celebrations upon hearing the news of the 9/11 architect’s death. I’m not saying he shouldn’t have been brought to justice, but I did challenge on my Facebook page whether the deliberate assassination of bin Laden without a formal trial really connotes the kind of justice that democratic countries promise.

I know, criticizing the Obama administration for a technical grievance about the execution of laws in such a matter isn’t very popular. Even if a 1976 U.S. law prohibits the targeted assassination of foreign citizens, why not just be happy with the death of a mass-murderer?

Never-mind that since the administration had carefully parsed their statements the Monday following the raid, they have now admitted that Osama was naked and unarmed when special forces blew his head off. Or that the intelligence gathered was not the result of torture “light”, and this might have some bearing on the debate about the disturbing justification of torture to achieve certain ends.

Referring back to the Lord’s Prayer, I’m not suggesting that we just forgive and forget what bin Laden is responsible for. But I do worry about the brutalizing of the nation. During my days in Lincoln-Douglas debate, the debate community paid a lot of attention to policies that “barbarize” a nation. I think this is exactly what’s happening in America these days.

Refer back to the magazine cover of a bulls-eye on Sadam Hussein. Amy Goodman observed that a more appropriate choice would have been a sniper-scope on a little child, because that’s who dies in war. Our wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are no different. Granted, Americans aren’t exposed to the thousands of images of kids with their limbs blown off, or mothers crying over their dead husbands and children (though the rest of the world has seen such images).

I was appalled several years back when the Pentagon was publicly defending its choice to bomb an Iraqi wedding because “insurgents were present. Therefore it was a justifiable military target.” Never-mind that during the early years of the war with the Taliban, the U.S. Air Force elected to bomb a Red Cross Hospital not once but three times.

Or consider that once upon a time we believed in rehabilitating criminals in the penal system. No one hears about that anymore. Nor do we give convicted criminals a proper chance of an honest living once they emerge from their cells.

When the Bush Administration released the bloody photographs of Sadam’s sons, you can similarly see the brutalization of the American public. And again, we see this effect in the prostrations of the American public at the altar of vengeance with the death of Osama bin Laden. Did you know that within a week of Osama’s death the U.S. conducted a drone attack to assassinate an American-born Muslim? Not concerned that targeted assassinations are now used to target American citizens—maybe because he is a Muslim and a leader in radical Islam?

I argued on Facebook that the extra-legal assassination of bin Laden is an abandoning of a principle that began with the Nuremberg Trials. Though we knew the Nazi criminals who helped carry out the Final Solution were guilty, we held them accountable in the courts to show the world our commitment to international laws and to democratic ideals. We didn’t just execute them without maintaining our dedication to courts of law.

No one can argue that bin Laden’s crimes exceed those of the Nazis. The Nazis were brought to justice after WWII, but America rejoices in the Old Western justice of just shooting a naked, unarmed bin Laden on sight. That’s not how a civilized country operates. The Obama Administration openly violated a well-established law from 1976. It demonstrated to the world that it goes beyond the law in seeking its vengeance.

I refer to the Old Testament law of Lex Talonis, better known as “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.” Despite the presumption of fundie Christians that we are a Christian nation, we refer back to the old Babylonian tradition of vengeance as our precept for “justice”. Hatred is a sure way to hollow out a person.

But not if you hate the right people, I suppose. I myself don’t hate those who I view as leading us on the path to an unpleasant and volatile future. I merely think they are operating based on what they know having been raised in a very deceptive culture. Our culture is the thing that whispers in our ear our whole life and has us accepting assumptions about the world that we’re not even aware of.

But that will be a discussion for another day. I just want to say that seeking vengeance is not the highest good or the most evolved action for “civilized” people. Holding people accountable is fine, but it should be done within the limits of international and domestic laws which maintain the public order and the responsibility of maintaining democratic principles. Such as, no one shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process.

© David Metcalf

What you DON’T know about Jesus

If you think I’m going to write scathingly about Jesus, I’m sorry to disappoint you. This is not an attack piece on the central figure of Christianity. Jesus is easily an admirable person, as Douglas Adams humorously stated, “[Jesus] was nailed to a tree for basically asking people to be a little nicer to each other.” But I will tell you something very few people know about the man who has tremendously influenced the Western world for two millennia.

The New Testament doesn’t reveal much about Jesus’ early life. There is a story that Mother Mary lost track of him at some point, and he was found giving a lecture to Judaic priests at the temple at (roughly) age six. But after that, the Bible is surprisingly silent on the time spanning that event and his arrival to Palestine at age (30?). So where was he, and what was he doing during that time?

Most accounts say that Mary and Joseph took him into hiding through a circuitous route through Egypt. Most people fairly knowledgeable of the Bible are aware of this. What almost all Christians don’t know is that there is an account of this missing period. But it isn’t in Egypt, it’s in south-east Asia.

I had once speculated on this to a college professor when I was writing a paper on Mo-Tzu, whose doctrines (pre-dating the days of Christ) are strikingly similar to Christ’s teachings. He replied, “that’s an interesting idea, but you’ll never find any evidence for that.” It turns out there is such evidence. It’s buried in ancient Sanskrit texts. German philologist Max Müller (1823-1900) claimed that he found this evidence hidden away in a remote temple.

He discovered an old text that claimed a man named Jesus did travel to India in the appropriate period and was exposed to Hindu and Buddhist teachings. As Jesus was apt to do, he got into a tough spot with Hindu priests over the Caste system, which he condemned. Deciding not to passively wait to be murdered, he fled India and eventually returned to Judea.

Interesting no? Well, if Max Müller discovered this over 100 years ago, how come no one knows it? He did write a book about it, you know. In academic fashion, his book was ignored for several years. Eventually the Catholic church caught wind of it and were appalled. Christ didn’t arrive at a seemingly Buddhist philosophy on his own, you say?

Another interesting point about this is that this Sanskrit record also details what happened to Jesus in Palestine. Its claims challenge the New Testament teaching that the Jewish priests were the architects of the crucifixion. In this account, the priests actually tried to intervene to spare the life of Jesus.

This would be news to the scores of Christians who condemned historic Jews by association for the crime of murdering the only son of God and messiah to Christian peoples. I would be rather cross on that point if I belonged to a people who have faced persecution and endless suffering for a crime a handful of their ancestors didn’t even commit.

Now, before we glorify Jesus, we need to understand—like all historical figures—he was more complicated and not so perfect as people think. He is quoted as saying that no man may follow him “if he doesn’t have hatred in his heart towards his mother and father.” Doesn’t sound like the Jesus Christians are acquainted with; you know, the one who adheres to the honor thy father and mother commandment?

He is also widely known to have said not to “cast pearls before the swine.” This has the obvious implication that wasting words of wisdom on the dull and ignorant is no different than taking precious pearls and throwing them into a crowd of barn-yard animals. Some take this quote to mean that Christ intended his message for Jews only. And that, like Buddha, maybe he did not intend to start a new religion but instead to reform an old one. But suppose that we assume that Christ had a world-wide message he intended for everyone, I’ll grant that. You still have to consider the story of the money-changers at the temple:

The loving Christ is biblically documented as giving the money-changers at temple a severe beating. We’re not talking about a mere slap here, we’re talking about a genuine ass-kicking. Arguably, he viewed the sacrilege of conducting business at the temple as defiling the house of God. This may be excusable (as I suppose a man who takes God seriously could understandably do this), but it does paint a different picture from the peaceful Christ familiar to Christians.

Christ was no doubt a complicated person. I won’t even get into the accounts of dozens upon dozens of other messiahs with the same attributes of Jesus (you know: virgin birth, twelve disciples, the death and resurrection in 3 days, forgiving your enemies, etc), or perhaps the apparent plagiarism of Christ’s miracles from the earlier Egyptian god Horus. I also won’t mention the scores of people who challenge that Jesus even existed. I’m willing to accept that a man named Jesus did exist.

But gosh, wouldn’t it be good to finally apologize to all Jews for laying the crime of all times at their doorstep?

It’s like a pen I once saw a manager with at JcPenny’s, “Why doesn’t anyone blame the godless Romans?” Isn’t it time we lay the responsibility with the Roman law that dictated that Jesus should be crucified (a Roman punishment) for the act of disrupting public order by violently attacking several respected merchants in front of a temple? And, just maybe, issue an apology unto all Jews for the tremendous suffering they have endured by prejudiced–and misinformed–Christians?

*Edit 6/1/11: I have received some thoughtful criticism of this post. Mostly, that it needs citations and some evidence. I quite agree, and will now post some preliminary evidence, hope to add more later.

Also, I was mistaken about Max Müller, it appears that it was actually Nicolas Notovitch and Levi H. Dowling who primarily argued that Jesus traveled to India in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Here is a 8 minute video from a longer 1 hour video which I could not locate:

© David Metcalf

Education and the Humanities

Schools are failing in their primary mission. The reasons are complicated in some respects, but in others it’s quite simple. Children should complete public education with three main understandings:

o Learning is life-long
o Thinking critically is fun and rewarding
o Knowing the trends and patterns of human history and where
power in society lies

Take history for example, history is much more than names, dates, and events. Knowing history is about understanding how power is used to organize society and how it is also abused. It’s about understanding the undercurrent of civilization and the foundations of what binds humans together in cooperative effort.

Schools have become very good at teaching kids to despise reading, view learning as boring, and think in lazy ways. Whether a student memorizes the “day of infamy” for a test and then performs a memory dump is irrelevant to understanding our heritage. History is about having access to the collected wealth of knowledge, both technical and philosophic.

We live in an age of easy access to information, yet we have raised generations of children who would rather watch TV or play video-games than read up on the humanities (after all, that’s what we’re doing). Mind you, I’m not saying video-games are bad; I’m rather fond of them. But I view them as a past-time at best and not something that should occupy all of your spare time.

The roots of all this lie with the founders of American public education. In the 1880’s, a debate was taking place about what should drive education. Should we embolden students to challenge the status quo and think independently, or should we train them to be successful and productive in a market economy. I think you know how this story ends. . .but it starts with an architect boldly stating, “We have enough doctors and lawyers and politicians. . . what we need is productive workers working in dark, dank places.”

There were opponents to this view, like John Dewey, who felt that students should leave education with the mind of challenging accepted cultural values and taking a proactive approach to challenging societal injustice. Although Dewey failed to appreciate the social ills of the Soviet revolution (he was an admirer), he may have been correct that we should rear our children in the task of challenging the world, instead of joining it.

A similar thing happened with the hippy generation. A counter-culture that challenged the world of work and cultural norms, ultimately failing because the hippies graduated from college and had to settle down to take on jobs and raise families. Owning stock gives you a stake in the capitalist economy. It’s hard to remain a radical once you’re watching MSNBC so you can get your news along with a stock ticker at the bottom of the screen.

I’m not saying that market Capitalism should be eradicated, or that it hasn’t met with some success. But you also have to recognize that much of that success was and is built on the backs of exploited laborers.

But returning to the issue of education, how should it be modeled? Perhaps the ancient Aryan culture (no, not that one) had the right idea with the Upanishads. The Upanishads translate to “come near and sit down.” The Aryan tribes which moved out of the Caucasus mountains in all directions–some of which settled in modern-day India–created a list of unanswerable questions to be discussed by successive generations of youths. These were philosophic, with no certain answers. The child’s role was to discuss and arrive at his/her own conclusions. The key is that this is what we would think today as critical thinking: teaching children how to process information and arrive at their own conclusions.

If our education does nothing else, it should rear children in the ways of thinking for themselves, loving new ideas and learning, and loving literature and the humanities. As mentioned, schools have done a lot of the opposite: kids think reading is boring (mostly), that learning is boring, and that learning stops once they get their diploma. Though trite, knowledge truly is power. But it’s hard to have it when you’re grinding it out for less than a living wage and your spare time is spent recuperating from a depressing job.

What should we teach our children about the notion of success? That it is earning good money, paying your bills, and nevermind whether you actually love what you do? It’s natural that parents want their children to be financially well-off. But what about pursuing their dreams and finding ways to contribute in meaningful ways? I shudder when I think of teachers warning students that if they don’t like school, then they will hate the world of work even more. If a student decides to do something artistic for less money and no job security, shouldn’t they be encouraged to do so?

We all have to deal with responsibility sooner or later. I would love to throw myself into writing, but I find that I have to concentrate on work to pay my bills, keep my health insurance, and earn the right to a warm bed and food in my fridge.

It wasn’t always this way, you know. Your membership in the tribe once guaranteed you access to those things. Humans didn’t trade paper notes for the right to the basic necessities. They traded energy in a Star Trekian mode of, what is good for all is good for me. I’m not saying we should desert the cities and try to live off the land. But I’m agreeing with Einstein when he stipulated that our human culture hasn’t evolved as rapidly as our technical prowess.

In fact, you could question whether we’ve actually regressed since the dawn of civilization, since our view of human dignity is essentially that it is earned rather than inherited. If you disagree, then consider the state of American politics when those who have health insurance are aghast that it could/should be given away to those without it. Usually it’s the have nots that get upset about their lot, but now we see that the haves are the ones who are truly enraged.

© David Metcalf

Desiderata by Max Ehrmann

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible, without surrender,
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even to the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons;
they are vexatious to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain or bitter,
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs,
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals,
and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love,
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment,
it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.

You are a child of the universe
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace in your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

Why Collect Quotes?

It’s simple enough: create an iGoogle page that displays new quotes of whatever interests you. Visit it every day and look for a keeper. Keep track of your quotes with a program called NoteTab Light (allowing you to keep tabs for different categories).

So why do it? Quotes are similar to poetry in that they are highly condensed bits of knowledge. In a few words, quotes can inspire us or challenge us to look at things differently. Quotes can pick us up on disappointing days or push us to work harder, consider the finer points of life, or to treat others better. Quotes can poke fun at the things we take too seriously.  They can open up new perceptions about culture and the cosmos.

I collect quotes for an additional reason: because I’m a teacher and I use quotes to reach my students. All teachers should consider starting a quote collection, because if nothing else, a weekly quote can fill a moment at the end or beginning of class as a topic for classroom discussion. They also serve a purpose outside of a classroom, I often recall quotes for friends when the conversation calls for them. These range from the humorous to the more serious (in my political conversations). A good quote can be used as a joke in the right context.

So begin your quote collection; there are plenty contained on the Internet. You can seek them out, or let them come to you on your iGoogle page. Once you have a good sized collection, you can tack them to your computer desktop or on your home’s walls for daily pick-me-ups. Consider tacking them up at your work desk or office space. Others will appreciate the words of wisdom.

While poetry is a layered form of condensed views, quotes are necessarily straight-forward. There are even quote-books that people somehow manage to get published. While this is an unlikely feat for you, there are still all the prior reasons for collecting them.

Since this is a post about quotes, I thought I’d include some of my favorites (though I have too many to share here):

“Always make a total effort, even when the odds are against you.” -Arnold Palmer

“Act as though what you do makes a difference. It does.” -James William

“About the most originality that any writer can hope to achieve honestly is to steal with good judgment.”
– Josh Billings

“Words ought to be a little wild for they are the assaults of thought on the unthinking.”
-John Maynard Keynes

© David Metcalf

Why you should buy a Kindle

If you haven’t joined the e-reader craze, now’s the time to start.

If you’re like I was, you probably think an e-reader is non-sense.  What’s wrong with an old fashioned book, anyhow?

Nothing, necessarily.  But e-readers such as the Kindle are good for several reasons:

• They are easier on the eyes
• You can change text size, words per line, etc
• You can get books for free, and usually pay less for retail books
• When you’re on a trip, you can take a whole library of books with you

That is not to say that page-books no longer have a purpose, or that you should throw out your library after buying an e-reader.  Books are still preferable for reading in the bathtub, taking to work, or to places where your Kindle may get damaged or lifted.

But the reason that the Kindle 3 is so useful is specifically the text size feature. Typographers lament how their findings are rarely heeded.  For instance, they have found that the easiest lines to read have between six to eight words per line.  Many printed books deviate from this standard.  Many more still have smaller print.

Take for instance, Lies My Teacher Told Me,  a great book, but challenging to read: both because it is dense material and because of its tiny script and tons of words per line.   After buying it on my Kindle, I found it much easier to read and absorb.

We’re not talking about changing the content of what you’re reading after all, only the text size and words per line.  You can still read whatever you want (most of the time).  The reason that words-per-line is so important is because reading requires you to drop down and to the left for each new line.  Add too many words in a line and reading becomes more taxing for your brain.

Just think of all the times you missed a line, had to go back to retrace your place, and so on. This alone is reason enough to go with an e-reader.

If you’re still hesitant to drop the cash on an e-reader (take for instance, that you have to charge it), just talk to someone you know who has one:  chances are, they love their Kindle.

Your only choice to make is to choose one of the e-readers currently on the market.  This is difficult, because no one e-reader is best for everyone.  It depends on what you want to do with it.  If you have a massive PDF collection and want to read them on an e-reader, you should avoid the Kindle 3. Support for PDF is very limited.  If you want a huge online collection of books to choose from, you can’t beat the selection offered at Amazon.com.

Also, with a program called Calibre, you can convert many e-book formats to Kindle’s MOBI format.  This allows you to make use of the thousands of ePub books from online libraries that the Kindle wouldn’t otherwise support.

The Kindle DX can run a lot of money, but I actually like that mine has a smaller screen (also for a lot less money).  It’s weighs less than the DX version, the battery does a little better, and the DX is only better for more words-per-line (as we’ve already discussed, this is not necessarily an advantage).

Feel free to post with comments or criticisms of e-readers.

© David Metcalf