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the UP! //:-) 145 jan 28 2003
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TEXT JOCKEY // TJ PHRASER (Fraser Clark) & THE MEDIA EVOLUTION MIXING THE TRACTS LIVE ON THE KEYBOARD @ A MEDIA-MEME RATE OF 160 IPP * * Ideas Per Paragraph
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Click Here to read the last UP!!
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contents:
AGAINST THE WAR: Ken Livingston + Brian Eno + Susie Orbach + Shirley Williams + Kurt Vonnegut + A.G.Ballard + Eisenhower!!!!
PENTAGON EYES MASS GRAVES p.4
GENETICALLY MODIFIED CROPS RUN WILD p.5
FIRST DANCEMUSIC RALLY p.10
THE WAR ON DRUGS, NEW COALITIONS IN THE OTHER WAR!
BUSH IS SUNK WITHOUT EUROPE p.16
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The UP! (or UP!grademag) is a global edutainment round-up, ‘broadcast’ weekly to =[10,934]= Alternative// Activist// Zippy// Trance// New Age folks who have been recommended to the Parallel YOUniversity//Megatripolis Dance Dept as "showing signs of life". Since many recipients choose to forward it to their own lists, we estimate 31,000+ direct recipients. Further, because of its less 'specialist' content, it's increasingly being posted on a variety of sites worldwide, making a conservatively estimated total weekly ‘readership’ of 275,000+
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* * * * * * * * * ASTRO ENERGY ANALYSIS FOR JAN. 29-FEB. 4 * * * * * *
CLARIFY AND OWN YOUR SOCIAL VISION
Relax today and tomorrow,
and allow your personal ideals to seep into your pores.
On the weekend we begin our annual new visionary cycle, and simultaneously we begin a cycle of independence.
It’s important we be strong
and clear about our own social vision,
for it’s certain that George Bush
will push hard to lay his vision on us.
Get the details in
Maya’s Daily Success Guide at
http://www.daykeeperjournal.com/
* * * * * * * * ** * * * * * * * ** * * * * * * * ** * * * * * * * * * * * * *
UP! YOUR SILENCE IS YOUR APPROVAL FEAR
WEAPONS OF DISTRACTION & MISINFORMATION
be ready for the big lies!
they’ve started already. tonight it was announced that the million-strong (and worldwide) rally for peace on feb 15 will NOT be allowed to end at hyde park because “it’s not safe due to the weather”. EVER HEAR ANYTHING LIKE IT? it’s the wrong weather for peace, see? danger of bush fires maybe?
THEY’RE RUNNING SCARED IN THE CORRIDORS OF POWER!
anyway, let’s take our astrologer’s advice and “be strong and clear about our own social vision”.
SAT FEB 15: MEGA DEMO FOR PEACE!!!!!!
I GOTTA £50 NOTE HERE SAYS THERE WILL BE A MILLION PEOPLE IN LONDON ALONE! DO U KNOW ANYONE WHO’S NOT GOING?!
THE Stop The War Coalition, TOO, EXPECT FAR FAR MORE THAN 400,000 PEOPLE WHO MARCHED ON SEPTEMBER THE 28TH.
THEY’VE ALREADY AGREED WITH THE METROPOLITAN POLICE THAT THERE WILL BE TWO STARTING POINTS FOR THE DEMONSTRATION.
A – EMBANKMENT @ NOON (nearest tube EMBANKMENT)
COACHES TO SET DOWN AT SOUTHWARK STREET AND PICK UP AT PARK LANE
B - GOWER STREET @ NOON (nearest tubes TOTTENHAM COURT ROAD/EUSTON SQUARE and EUSTON) GROUPS TRAVELLING DOWN FROM THE NORTH AND PEOPLE FROM NORTH LONDON ARE ASKED TO GO HERE.
NOW GET THIS, FROM THE COALITION:
IGNORE RUMOURS THAT THE GOVERNMENT IS ATTEMPTING TO STOP THE COALITION FROM HOLDING A RALLY IN HYDE PARK AT THE END OF THE DEMONSTRATION. WE WISH TO ADVISE EVERYONE THAT THE MARCH IS NOT BEING CHALLENGED, AND THAT WE EXPECT THEM TO ALLOW US TO HAVE THE RALLY AS ORIGINALLY AGREED IN HYDE PARK.
INFO NO: 0207 053 2153/4/5/6
UP!
the UP! kicks off with news of some pretty horrible things going on. but it’s becoming increasingly clear that the dinosaurs are losing control of the forces they’ve unleashed and that more and more people across the planet (no longer excepting the great american public) are daily being more shocked awake from their consumerist, nothing-to-do-with-me slumber by the patent insanities & hypocrisies now beginning to come to light.
bush’s approval ratings have slipped to the mid-50s – respectable for a half-way president, but down 10% in a few months - and he no longer looks unstoppable to anyone (which is freeing people from fear of him and his gang of sociopaths). and a majority now disapprove of his handling of the issue that will eclipse even Iraq as a priority for voters – the economy. the massive slow-motion stock market crash should reduce that to near zero. 1.5 million jobs have been lost since bush took over.
and 70% believe that UN inspectors should be given months or “however long it takes” to complete their work.
and talking about international community coalitions? IT LOOKS LIKE 150 AGAINST WAR AND 9 FOR (and that’s just their governing elites)
on february 15th in britain alone the peace movement will probably draw close to a million protesters– unheard of BEFORE a war!
since dinosaurs, of course, don’t read the writing on the wall - they bash it down - there could still be a turkey shoot in iraq. BUT WAR WILL SOON BE MADE ILLEGAL, BUSH WILL BE SWEPT AWAY AS HISTORY’S SCHMUCK, AND THE NEWS WILL GET BETTER AND BETTER AS THE OLD AGE STARTS DISAPPEARING FOREVER UP ITS OWN CONSTIPATED, UNDIGESTED BACKSIDE :)
UP!
IMPORTANT MESSAGE FOR THE MAN IN THE MOON
When NASA was preparing for the Apollo Project, it took the astronauts to a Navajo reservation in Arizona for training.
One day, a Navajo elder & his son came across the space crew walking among the rocks. The elder, who spoke only Navajo, asked a question which his son translated for the NASA people: "What are these guys in the big suits doing?"
One of the astronauts told him they were practising for a trip to the moon. When his son relayed this comment, the Navajo elder got all excited & asked if it would be possible to give the astronauts a message to deliver to the spirits on the moon.
Recognising a promotional opportunity when he saw one, a NASA official accompanying the astronauts said, "Why certainly!" and sent an underling for a tape recorder. The Navajo elder's comments into the microphone were brief, his son laughing uproariously, but refusing to translate.
So the NASA people took the tape to a nearby Navajo village & played it for other members of the tribe. They too laughed long & loudly, slapping their knees, but also refused to translate the elder's message to the moon.
An official government translator was finally summoned. When he finally stopped laughing, he relayed the message:
"WATCH OUT FOR THESE PRICKS. THEY’LL STEAL YOUR LAND."
[gerald.van.waes / belgium]
UP! BRITISH AMERICAN TOBACCO - Pushing an addictive and deadly product by dishonest means. (worst corporations of 2002)
UPDATE ON THE PATH DOWN WHICH WE’RE BEING LED. DO WE REALLY WANT TO GO THERE? ARE OUR COMFORTS SO IMPORTANT WE CAN’T BE JUST A BIT FAIRER & MORE SHARING WITH THE REST OF THE WORLD?
PENTAGON EYES MASS GRAVES
Option would fight contamination after bioterror
By Greg Seigle / Denver Post
Friday, January 24, 2003 - WASHINGTON - The bodies of U.S. soldiers killed by chemical or biological weapons in Iraq or future wars may be bulldozed into mass graves and burned to save the lives of surviving troops, under an option being considered by the Pentagon.
Since the Korean War, the U.S. military has taken great pride in bringing home its war dead, returning bodies to next of kin for flag-draped, taps- sounding funerals complete with 21-gun salutes.
But the 53-year-old tradition could come to an abrupt halt if large numbers of soldiers are killed by chemical or biological agents, according to a proposal quietly circulating through Pentagon corridors.
Army spokesmen said the option to bury or burn bodies contaminated by chemical or biological weapons is being considered, along with the possibility of placing contaminated corpses in airtight body bags and sending them home for closed-casket funerals.
UP! CATERPILLAR - Knowingly supplying D-9 bulldozers to the Israeli military to use in their programme of home destruction in the West Bank. (worst corporations of 2002)
John Sulston, Led Britain's involvement in the decoding of the human genome and was awarded a Nobel Prize for medicine - We are told that unilateralism is being pressed on us by the US. Whatever its provenance, I consider it to be dangerous in the extreme. It is not only immoral, but also in the long run is liable to be counterproductive to our security. For long-term world peace we need to strengthen the UN. Unilateral actions have the reverse effect.
UP! US GOVERNMENT: #1 WEAPONS DEALER, PLANET EARTH
u.k.
UPDATE ON THE PATH DOWN WHICH WE’RE BEING LED.
GENETICALLY MODIFIED CROPS RUN WILD
The final report on gene flow from oilseed rape from UK Farm Scale Trials has now been published by DEFRA and shows that GM oilseed rape (canola) interbreeds with conventional rape and weeds.
Between 1994 and 2002, the government has run Farm Scale
Trials to study the impact of GM crops on agricultural practices and on
the environment. The results are what critics have voiced long enough: The GM
crops interbred with other crops and with weeds. In this case GM oilseed rape
interbred with wild turnip, forming a herbicide resistant weed.
Other cases of GM contamination are well known, but have often been considered
not scientifically proven, despite being peer-reviewed. The most alarming so
far were GM contamination of Mexican maize landraces. Another
example is crop-to-crop contamination of canola (oilseed rape). It became
obvious when Percy Schemeiser, a Canadian farmer, was sued by Monsanto. Since
then canola plants grew that had acquired resistance to 3 different herbicides
through cross-pollination.
The promises made about GM crops are crumbling. By now it is obvious that
herbicide-tolerant GM crops actually increase the use of herbicides, and
that for example Roundup Ready soybean varieties yield less
than conventional ones. Only some side-effects in the introduction of GM
soybeans like different weed management currently keep yields higher at some
farms.
Environmental activists and consumer organisations have continued to raise
awareness. For years actions to weed fields of GM crops or to block sowing
have taken place, carried out by activists and scientists, farmers and
consumers fighting for their right to decide what they want to eat and for an
agricultural system where sustainable, organic agriculture is possible.
Actions are taking place worldwide:
UP! PLEASE DON'T SEND ME TO KILL PEOPLE
PEACE IS PATRIOTIC
Ken Livingstone, Mayor of London - War against Iraq is being planned to further the oil interests of the US. It is a diversion from tackling the problem of groups such as al-Qaeda. A new Gulf war will deepen, not resolve, the sense of injustice that is felt not only in the Middle East but also in most of the so-called Third World. A war that is unjustified in the eyes of most of the people of the world will act as a recruiting sergeant for Islamic fundamentalists and - ultimately - a new generation of terrorists. I cannot stand by as mayor of a city that would inevitably become a potential target of terrorism without saying that such a policy would be a terrible folly.
UP! MILITARY SOLUTIONS ARE PROBLEMS NOT MY SONS
OR THIS... BUT THAT’S ENUFF FOR ONE WEEK, RIGHT?
THE NUCLEAR NIGHTMARE BEGINS
A startling new report based on research in Afghanistan points to the likelihood of
large numbers of the population being exposed to uranium dust and debris. When the Afghan crisis
began, many believed that a great amount of DU/dirty uranium would be used to achieve
the US-British campaign objectives. The amount used in Afghanistan may have exceeded the several hundred
ton's of DU/dirty uranium used in the 1990-91 Gulf War and the Balkans conflicts.
The refusal of the Ministry of Defence to fully admit that dangerous uranium
weapons may have been used in Afghanistan and the conflicts in the Balkans
(Bosnia and Kosova), when evidence shows the contrary, illustrates just how
sensitive the government is to the possibility that its use, or its collusion
in the use, of weapons of mass destruction may be discovered.
This is not just because thousands of innocent civilians will suffer due to radiological (and heavy
metal) poisoning,
but also because the government is prepared to send British troops and aid
workers, possibly for a long occupation of the war zones, ill-equipped and
vulnerable to contamination.
FULL REPORT
http://uk.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=50059&group=webcast
UP! WHAT IF WAR WAS NOT AN OPTION?
DISARM AMERICA
you can vote, too! go here and vote:
http://www.time.com/time/europe/gdml/peace2003.html
TIMEeurope.com
Poll Results
Which country
poses the greatest danger to world peace in 2003?
North Korea 07.6 %
Iraq 08.6 %
The United States 83.8 %
Total Votes Cast: 295,409 ( 1/26/2003)
UP! GO SOLAR, NOT BALLISTIC TELL THE PEOPLE THE
TRUTH!
"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist." President Eisenhower - farewell address 1961.
UP!
"The effect of fear, uncertainty, and shattered confidence (US corporate scandals) hold the market in a vice-like grip of despair. It seems unlikely that the markets will rally." Evening Standard
UP!
Alan Bleasdale, Screenwriter - I just think, passionately, it is the wrong war at the wrong time with the wrong ally against the wrong people.
UP! WHO IS THE ENEMY? I SAID, DO NOT KILL IN MY NAME GOD
TEN EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES
Technology Review's editors have identified ten emerging technologies they predict will have a tremendous influence in the near future:
- Wireless Sensor Networks
- Injectable Tissue Engineering
- Nano Solar Cells
- Mechatronics (integrated mechanical-electronic components with intelligent-software control)
- Grid Computing
- Molecular Imaging
- Nanoimprint Lithography
- Software Assurance
- Glycomics (turning sugars into drugs)
- Quantum Cryptography
UP! WYETH - Pushing the unproven benefits of its hormone replacement therapy, against trials evidence to the contrary. A triumph of marketing over science." (worst corporations of 2002)
SPEED OF GRAVITY MEASURED FOR FIRST TIME!
The speed of gravity has been measured for the first time. The landmark experiment shows that it travels at the speed of light, supporting Einstein's general theory of relativity. The result will help narrow down the possible number of extra dimensions in the universe
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=1567&m=5435
UP! M&M/MARS - Knowingly selling chocolate made with child slave labour. (worst corporations of 2002)
Robert del Naja, Musician with Massive Attack - No one I talk to believes it is really about regime change. It is about controlling the oil in the Middle East in the face of a new recession and because of worries about continued access to oil in Saudi Arabia. We seem to be living in an age of transparency, where these motives are clear, but nobody is saying it.
UP! LET US NOT BECOME THE EVIL WE DEPLORE "W" IS FOR WAR MONGER
UPDATE ON THE PATH DOWN WHICH WE’RE BEING LED. DO WE REALLY WANT TO GO THERE?
THE IRAQ FOLLIES
Charley Reese
More than a decade ago, I wrote that the first George
Bush had inadvertently provided Saddam with guaranteed protection against a coup. By making war on
the Iraqi people and by so obviously being in
the pocket of the Israelis, the United States assured that any Iraqi who tried to replace Saddam would be
immediately branded an American-Zionist agent and ripped apart by the Iraqi people. Iraqis, who
don't like Saddam, dislike the United States and Israeli
governments even more.
If there’s no chance, then, of a replacement surviving in the top spot, there’s
no point in taking the enormous risk of trying to assassinate a man who’s an
expert in survival. Our current President Bush has continued the "protection"
policy. Only a senior leader would have even a slim chance of getting close
enough to Saddam to whack him, and our esteemed president has let it go public
that Iraqi senior leaders will be tried as war
criminals. All that piece of stupidity does is
guarantee that the senior leadership will remain loyal to Saddam.
So it looks increasingly as if the president is going to have to go to war if
he wants to eliminate Saddam Hussein. It looks as if he will have to go to war
in the face of a United Nations inspections report that says no evidence of
Iraqi weapons of mass destruction can be found. That probably won't deter
Bush, but it will create enormous and profound problems for the United States. We will be viewed by most of the world as a bully and a
hypocrite of the first order.
In the meantime, he might also blunder us into a war with North Korea. While we
can probably take Iraq with relatively few American casualties, there’s
no way under the sun to fight a Korean War II without very large American casualties. In the first place,
within hours of the start of the war, the 37,000 Americans sitting there as a tripwire will be dead. I doubt the North
Koreans will bother to take any prisoners this time. Already the
neoconservatives are trying to downplay Korean strength by harping on how poor
the country is.
America's relationship with Israel is behind this problem. North
Korea, even with nuclear weapons, is no threat to the United States. The Israelis, however, are deathly afraid that North Korea will sell nuclear warheads and long-range missiles to Iran or other Israeli
enemies. Don't take my word for it. Watch your cable news shows. The same pro-Israel, pro-war-with-Iraq crowd
has already started yakking about how dangerous it would be if North Korea were allowed to export its weapons. Dangerous to whom?
Well, they never say, but they obviously mean Israel, since the
Israelis themselves have often voiced this fear in Israeli newspapers. Their
"axis of evil" and
our "axis of evil" are the same.
http://reese.king-online.com/Reese_20030115/index.php
UP! PROCTER & GAMBLE - Cashing in big-time on third-world coffee crops while the producers starve. (worst corporations of 2002)
HEMP IS AN HERB. BUSH IS A DOPE
hi fraser!
i wanted to let you know that i drove up from LA to attend the demonstration in san fran last weekend, and it was absolutely incredible! it was my first time in a demo of that magnitude, and it felt really great to be among so many other US citizens who felt strongly enough to be there too! people were really creative with their signs. one young girl, maybe 13, was wearing a shirt that i think you & your readers will appreciate. it said "HEMP IS AN HERB. BUSH IS A DOPE." : )
interestingly enough, there's a huge discrepancy between the #s reported by the police, the san francisco chronicle
>>> will stop u there, natalie. such tomfoolery happens all the time
you couldn't see an end to the sea of people, in all directions (a truly beautiful sight). the police reviewed their counting methods and now believe 150,000 is a closer approximation. i tend to agree.
>>> dubble what the cops say is my advice :)
yay for demonstrations! your article on protesting being good for your health was right!
love
natalie / orangekids/los angeles
UP! GEORGE, IT'S THE COKE HONEY, IT MAKES YOU MEAN
//YOU FEEDBACK:
>>Several weeks ago special US forces were admitted to be operating inside Iraq. There's a strong likelihood that their function has been to plant and hide biological and chemical weapons material, their whereabouts to be disclosed to the to the UN weapons inspectors shortly after their report on the JAN 27. Their 'discovery' would trigger the US/British invasion early in February.
I've always expected the US to do whatever is necessary to "prove" their case. The decision is already made to go to war and the only "hitch" is the opposition from the population of the world. They wouldn't even bother to prove anything except that the voices asking for truth are getting so strong.
The latest reports seem to indicate that the Administration will "prove" its case by starting to release their information. In the next few days they will "declassify" wire taps of Iraqi officials discussing hiding materials. We'll see if people believe that or not. It's like a reverse of the Osama Bin laden audio releases. The US examines such a release and says "we think it is or isn't actually from him." When the US releases their Iraqi Tapes we'll see if people believe it or think someone just got clever in the audio editing room.
UP!
los angeles
TUES FEB 4 FIRST DANCEMUSIC RALLY
The Dance And Nightlife Coalition of Electronic Music (DANCEmusic), that brave buncha Southern California electronic music aficionados who organised the Freedom To Dance Rally at the Westwood Federal Building in LA last September against the federal RAVE Act, now urge you to join them in once again protecting our common culture.
For now there’s a new threat, insidiously buried in an amendment in the Omnibus Domestic Security bill - S.22 (see the "crack-house statute amendments of the bill at: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c108:1:./temp/~c108QFaE0x:e439542: ) sponsored by Senate minority leader Tom Daschle.
THE CAMPAIGN AGAINST THE RAVE ACT
When drug warriors introduced the RAVE Act, they thought they had the perfect election year drug war bill which targeted a musical style and culture the political elites believed no one cared about.
The bill was put on a fast track enabling it to pass out of committee only a week after it was introduced, without debate or recorded vote. Most politicians thought it would soar through Congress and become law in no time. But they were wrong!
A determined grassroots movement sprang up nationwide to defeat the bill. With the help of ordinary ravers, The Alliance launched a major campaign - educating Senators, mobilising voters, alerting the media, and building legislative coalitions.
In conjunction EMDEF, Dance Safe, the Drug Policy Alliance, the ACLU, ROAR (Ravers Organized Against the RAVE Act, DC), Buzzlife, the SFLNC, Freedom To Dance (LA) and Rock The Vote launched a fax campaign that sent over 35,000 faxes to the Senate in opposition to the RAVE Act. Thousands of voters also called and wrote their Senators urging them to vote against it.
The campaign gained national attention, with news articles across the country. It was so successful that two of the original RAVE Act co- sponsors dropped their support for the bill (including the Chair of the Judiciary Committee). The House Subcommittee on Crime refused to hold a vote on the House version of the bill and the Senate leadership did not dare bring the controversial legislation to the full Senate for a vote.
THE NEW THREAT
Now the organisers of the LA Freedom to Dance Protest are creating a new organisation to fight encroachments on dance music culture in Southern California and nationwide. It’s called Dance And Nightlife Coalition of Electronic Music (DANCEmusic) and its efforts focus on blocking the above legislation and any future threats to dance music locally or nationally.
ACTIONS TO TAKE
*** You can contact your Senators through the Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121. To find out who your Senators are go to: http://www.senate.gov/senators/senator_by_state.cfm.
Tell them:
1) You oppose the "crack house statute" amendments in S.22. They are amendments Title V, Subtitle A, Part 4 Sections 5131 to 5136.
2) These provisions are just like the provisions in the RAVE Act last year.
3) The provisions would endanger public health, free speech, and property rights.
4) Urge them to contact Daschle's office and work to get these provisions removed from S.22.
** Fax Senator Daschle (even if he is not one of your two Senators). To fax Senator Daschle go to: http://actioncenter.drugpolicy.org/action/index.asp?step=2&item=1448.
** Please forward this action alert to your friends and family. The Senate needs to know that voters find this bill unacceptable.
Please join with us at the meeting on February 4th.
8pm @ Qtopia, 6021 Hollywood Blvd.
rsvp@dancem.org
UP! SCHERING PLOUGH - Subject of no less than four criminal investigations into irregular marketing and manufacturing practices. (worst corporations of 2002)
//YOU FEEDBACK
>>> ALL terrorism stems originally from injustice, which, if it gets deep enuff, leads the dispossessed and brave into extreme politics and fundamentalisms.
All? Should we, the victims of state terror, therefore feel sorry for our dispossessed and brave leaders?
Add up the body counts over the last 100 years and I'm sure states have
terrorised far more people than the stereotypical extremist gangs. If you've seen the film Enemy at the Gates, there's a scene where Russian conscripts are being shot at by the Germans in front of them, and by their leaders from behind, for turning back.
The IRA may have killed 3000 people over 30 years but World War II killed maybe 50 million in about six years. Not that either is any good - one person terrorised is one person too many, dead or alive. So in these terrible times, let's have a bit less sympathy for terror - whatever the motivation.
Daniel / Mexico city
hmm. i was agreeing with you up till your last paragraph. oh, but now having read it again i see what u mean. and i agree.
the word "terror" is the prob. am defining it as the only weapon the dispossessed retain beyond a certain point of state repression.
UP! CITIGROUP - Screwing the poor out of house & home. (worst corporations of 2002)
Susie Orbach, Psychoanalyst - I feel very uneasy, deeply concerned, and very uneager to see any conflict. I don't think it will contribute to the longterm stability of that area. The situation in Palestine seems critical to me. The link between the secular Iraqi regime and al-Qaeda does not seem clear.
UP! LET'S HAVE THE WORLD'S FIRST PEACE PARTY WITH THE $200
BILLION DEFEND DEMOCRACY- SPEAK OUT
Djibouti, Yemen, Oman, Qatar, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia - U.S. military bases established in Arab countries since 1990.
UP! BOMBS MAKE ORPHANS NO MORE US WARS WAR
NOW, THINK LATER
"There was no point in seeking to convert the intellectuals. For intellectuals would never be converted and would anyway always yield to the stronger, which will always be the man in the street. Arguments must therefore be crude, clear and forcible, and appeal to emotions and instincts, not the intellect. Truth was unimportant and entirely subordinate to tactics and psychology... Hatred and contempt must be directed at particular individuals."
Dr Joseph Goebbels, Hitler's Propaganda Minister [The Goebbels Diaries, H. Trevor-Roper (ed)
UP! DYNCORP - Privatized military, doing the US government's dirty work in Afghanistan, Colombia, and formerly Bosnia. (worst corporations of2002)
please accept my heartfelt thanks for your dedication and for creating this thriving forum that has taken on a life of its own! YOU are the BOMB! Positively exploding with ideas!
Phoenix, Warrior-Priestess
UP! ANGRY WHITE GUY FOR PEACE WHAT WOULD JESUS BOMB
Ian Roberts, Professor of public health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine - This is a war about North American car dependence. The physical and economic infrastructure of the US is so highly car dependent that it is pathologically addicted to oil. If this war was really about weapons of mass destruction, then the US would have opposed (rather than being complicit in) their use against the Kurds and against Iran.
UP! UNITED WE STAND AGAINST KILLING CIVILIANS WHOA
COWBOY!
Seriously, great stuff you have here, though I'm admittedly not a David Icke fan and I strongly suspect Chavez is another typical demagogue in populist guise. But what the hey, your politics and environmental perspective are right on the money, in my book anyway. Looking forward to more.
David Randall / mexico city
UP! WORLD CITIZENS, PLEASE FORGIVE AMERICA RISE
MIGHTY PEOPLE
Shirley Williams, Leader of the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords - First, if the inspectors ask for additional
time they should be given it. It would be unjustified and immoral to go
to war unless there were clear evidence from the inspections of a deliberate
and systematic breach of the terms of the United Nations resolution, or unless
Saddam refused to co-operate. But I would not rule it out completely, because I
think it is vital to keep up the pressure. I think containment has been rather
remarkably successful in Iraq.
UP! HOW MANY DEATHS TO POWER EACH CAR?
KEEP FEAR ALIVE: BE SILENT
//YOU FEEDBACK: SANTA SHAMAN
Dear Fraser,
Apparently Prince Albert was very keen on collecting all sorts of folk
traditions from his native Germany and brought them to England where jolly old St Nicholas was transformed into Santa, no doubt
with a bit of interference from the shamanic tradition. It was the era of folk
revivalism and children's illustrated story books. I think Michael Harner
mentions this in The Way of The
Shaman, along with the Siberian
shaman explanations.
I also recall he talks about drinking reindeer urine. Since the reindeer had
been eating Fly Agaric, the urine had a strongly hallucinogenic effect,
producing the sensation of flying. Hence the flying sleigh.
I'm enjoying the newsletter and will send on any snippets if and when they come
to mind.
Best Wishes,
Richard
/ Oregon, USA
>> don’t tell me i forgot to mention the reindeer piss!
UP! COMPASSIONATE? I'M REALLY CONFUSED
ACTIVISM IS CITIZENSHIP
Gordon Taylor, Chief executive, Professional Footballers' Association - To consider a war on Iraq just with ourselves and America would be not only dangerous but foolish. It is imperative that because of the repercussions that would follow throughout the world, that any such action has the full support of the UN, otherwise Britain will be at the end of a backlash the British people don't deserve. Our priorities should centre at home, on sorting out the firemen's dispute, and financing improved transport, education and health.
UP! HOW DID OUR OIL GET UNDER THEIR SAND?
Kurt Vonnegut.
THE MASK OF SANITY
“I don't want to belong to a country that attacks little countries. I don't want to belong to that kind of a country. “
Psychopathic personalities – hereinafter P.P.s – that’s the medical term for smart, personable people who have no conscience. P.P.s are fully aware of how much suffering their actions will inflict on others but do not care. They cannot care.
The classic medical text about how such attractive leaders bring us into unspeakable calamities is The Mask of Sanity by Dr. Hervey Cleckley. An American P.P. at the head of a corporation, for example, could enrich himself by ruining his employees and investors and still feel as pure as the driven snow. A P.P., should he attain a post near the top of our federal government, might feel that taking the country into an endless war with casualties in the millions was simply something decisive to do today. And so to bed.
With a P.P., decisiveness is all.
Again, as Cleckley says, these people are around and do rise. Women are attracted to them. I mean, this is a defect, but women are attracted to them because they’re so confident. They really don't give a fuck what happens – not even to themselves. But this is a serious defect and, no, we haven't been invaded and conquered by Martians. We’ve been conquered by psychopathic personalities who are attractive.
UP! IF WAR WAS THE
ANSWER, WE'D BE AT PEACE
SCHIZO-MAGNETISM?
SCIENTIST BOMBARDS BRAINS WITH SUPER-MAGNETS TO EDIFYING EFFECT
Researchers are using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to block or enhance brain activity in specific areas. The aim is to treat brain problems such as schizophrenia, post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, Parkinson's Disease, and stroke.
It may also be effective in mental enhancement
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=1586&m=5435
UP!
IS BUSH MORE
LIKE JESUS OR HITLER?
NEW COALITIONS IN THE OTHER WAR,
THE WAR ON DRUGS!
Criminalising peaceful people who use psychoactive drugs to
deepen their spiritual life is criminal itself, some groups are arguing.
Salim Muwakkil / Chicago Tribune
A new
front has opened in opposition to the war on drugs - a religious front. Several newly formed
groups are contesting our prohibitionist, anti-drug strategies because they
restrict religious freedom and "cognitive liberty."
Drugs alter consciousness and "the right to control
one's own consciousness is the quintessence of freedom," reads part of a
manifesto of the Journal of Cognitive Liberties. The journal is one of
many projects of the four-year-old Center for Cognitive Liberty &
Ethics
(www.cognitiveliberty.org), a California-based, non-profit group that promotes
intellectual freedom. The group defines cognitive liberty as "the
right of each individual to think independently and autonomously, to use the
full spectrum of his or her mind and to engage in multiple modes of thoughts
and alternative states of consciousness."
The group is involved in several projects designed to raise issues of cognitive
liberty in relation to the war on drugs. In the journal's Summer 2000 edition,
center co-director Richard Glen Boire wrote "the so-called
`war on drugs' is not a war on pills, powder, plants and potions, it is war on
mental states - a war on consciousness itself - how much, what sort we are
permitted to experience, and who gets to control it." Boire argued that much of
the motivation for the war on drugs is an attack on
"entheogenic" drugs (roughly, God evoking) that provoke "transcendent
and beatific states of communication with the deity."
With this point, Boire lends his argument to a growing movement of Americans devoted to the use
of entheogens. One branch of this movement calls itself "neo-shamanistic" and seeks out
shamanic inebriants that have been used for centuries. They cite examples like
peyote
cactus and psilocybin
mushrooms
among Native Americans, ibogaine among indigenous Africans, soma in India and ayahuasca in the Amazonian rain forest.
Others are just spiritual seekers who argue that criminal sanctions on the use
of these psychoactive sacraments restrict their religious freedom. Some make the
argument that the state takes its cue from organised religions, which
historically have demonised entheogens because they lessen the need for a
clergy to connect God to humanity.
Many of the substances they champion (psilocybin, peyote / mescaline, LSD,
marijuana,
etc.) are the same drugs that were called psychedelic during the 1960s. These
substances are now called entheogenic to distance them from the hedonistic
excesses of the '60s drug culture.
Along with some newly discovered substances (salvia divinorium,
phalaris grass, ibogaine, ayahuasca/yage, etc), some of which are still
precariously legal, this fledgling movement is taking the spiritual high road in its opposition to the
drug war.
Another one of the groups leading the charge is the Council on Spiritual
Practices.
Founded by Robert Jesse, 43, a former vice president of Oracle, the group
focuses on evoking "primary religious experiences," which they believe
can be evoked by many practices, including fasting, meditation,
prayer, yoga
and ingesting entheogenic drugs.
The group's signature text is "Psychoactive
Sacramentals: Essays on Entheogens and Religion," which explores many facets of
entheogenic use. The book is an account of a 1995 conference held at the Chicago Theological
Seminary that
was devoted to the subject of entheogens and religion.
The council has also published
Huston Smith's book, "Cleansing the Doors of Perception: The Religious Significance of
Entheogenic Plants and Chemicals,"
a text that tackles the issue of drugs and spirituality in a series of
wide-ranging essays.
Smith, 83, is a religious scholar and author of many books, including "The World's Religions," the most widely used textbook on its
subject for more than 30 years. He has also produced three series for public
television: "The Religions of Man," "The Search for America" and (with Arthur Compton) "Science and Human
Responsibility."
In other words, Smith certainly is no fly-by-night bohemian just looking for a
high. "I
was extremely fortunate in having some entheogenic experiences, while the
substances were not only legal, but respectable," Smith said, talking about his early
experimentation with LSD, in a 2001 Salon magazine interview. "It seemed like only fair play that,
since I value those experiences immensely, to do anything I could to enable a
new generation to also have such experiences without the threat of going to
jail."
Criminalising peaceful people who use psychoactive drugs to deepen their
spiritual experience or widen their cognitive horizons is criminal itself,
these groups argue.
Their arguments are catching on.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/oped/chi-0301200183jan20,1,1869367.story
UP! DEAD WRONG DEAD CHILDREN BUSH IS AN
EMPTY WARHEAD
J.G. Ballard, Writer - My feeling is one of great anxiety. What's really frightening is all the possible consequences of a war ... the hatred of the entire Arab world focused on the US and Britain. The Americans can look after themselves, but I'm not sure if we British can look after ourselves. The possibility of a terrorist attack in London or elsewhere in Britain is frightening.
UP! HOW MANY LIVES PER GALLON?
LIES, DAMNED LIES, AND PIZZA
dear fraser,
when i lived in london, a pizza shop opened in the vacant shop below our flat. the proprietor was from iraq and told me he was formerly high up in the iraq military.
he said he was one of 20 or so high-up military leaders who Wanted to overthrow saddam hussein and create a democracy. during the gulf war these 20 military groups moved on baghdad.
"we had the city in a ring of steel and in 24 hours we could have killed saddam hussein" he told me. interestingly, at this point the western nations intervened and stopped their operation. the 20 iraqi military leaders were each "adopted" by a different western nation and never saw one another again.
my downstairs neighbour was taken to washington DC where he was put up in a hotel for a year while they explained to him that it was better for world peace that saddam hussein stayed in power. they wanted a "bad guy" in the region - but one they felt they could control.
then my downstairs neighbour said he accepted an offer to be set up with a new life in the UK. he was being given a monetary allowance from the government to help him set this pizza shop business up. the pizza shop didn't last long, one day he disappeared and i never saw him again... i hope he's allright.
nicole / paris
UP! SHELL OIL - Large-scale environmental and human rights violations, given a greenwash. Don't believe the hype, read www.shellfacts.org (worst corporations of 2002)
BUSH
IS SUNK WITHOUT EUROPE
Even while George Bush growls out his bellicose message, his country has never been in such an enfeebled state
Will Hutton
WHEN THE STOCK market falls for a record 10 consecutive days, as it just did,
you take notice. Falls like these are usually the portent of something bad, even calamitous, ahead. The
worry is obvious; Bush's intentions on Iraq could have potentially disastrous economic repercussions.
America’s economic position is far too vulnerable to allow it to go to war without cast-iron multilateral support that could underpin it economically as well as diplomatically and militarily. The multi-lateralism Bush scorns is, in truth, an economic necessity.
America may be a superpower that spends more on defence than the next nine countries combined and preparing to increase defence spending this year by an enormous $48 billion, equivalent to Britain's entire defence budget, but it is a strategic position built on economic sand.
On latest estimates, its net liabilities to the rest the world are more than $2.7 trillion, nearly 30% of GDP, a scale of indebtedness associated with basket-case economies in Latin America.
Its industrial base is so uncompetitive that it consistently imports more than it exports; its current-account deficit, the gap between all its current foreign earnings and foreign spending, is now a stunning 5% of GDP, continuing a trend that has lasted for more than 25 years and which is the cause of all that foreign debt. As a national community, it has virtually ceased to save so that government and individuals alike live on credit.
To finance the current-account deficit, a reflection of the lack of saving, the US relies on foreigners supplying it with the foreign currency it can't earn itself. The Old Europe that Donald Rumsfeld mocked last week has been helping to prop up the US economy, buying shares and bonds on Wall Street, taking over American companies and investing in real estate, compensating for the saving that the Americans aren't doing themselves.
BUT IF FOREIGNERS got windy about the prospects for share and property prices and stopped buying, or began to withdraw some of the trillions they have invested in the US economy, the dollar would collapse. Already, it has fallen nearly 10% against the euro over the last six weeks, but that could just be the beginning. Economists at the Federal Reserve have estimated that the dollar needs to fall by 30% to bring the flow of imports and exports into balance, but in today's markets such a fall doesn't happen gradually. It happens precipitately.
http://www.observer.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,882358,00.html
UP! ARTHUR ANDERSEN - Teaching A Lesson (worst corporations of 2002)
http://multinationalmonitor.org/
BRIAN ENO
THE U.S. NEEDS TO OPEN UP TO THE WORLD
To this European, America is trapped in a fortress of arrogance and ignorance
Europeans have always looked at America with a mixture of fascination and puzzlement, and now, increasingly, disbelief.
- How can a country that prides itself on its economic success have so many very poor people?
- How can a country so insistent on the rule of law seek to exempt itself from international agreements?
- And how can the world's beacon of democracy have elections dominated by wealthy special interest groups?
For
me, the question has become: "How can a country that has produced so
much cultural and economic wealth act so dumb?"
I could fill this page with the names of Americans who have influenced,
entertained and educated me. They represent what I admire about America: a vigorous originality of
thought, and a confidence that things can be changed for the better. That was
the America I lived in and enjoyed from
1978 until 1983. That America was an act of faith - the faith that "otherness" was not threatening
but nourishing, the faith that there could be a country big enough in spirit to
welcome and nurture all the diversity the world could throw at it. But since
Sept. 11, that vision has been eclipsed by a suspicious, introverted America, a country-sized version of
that peculiarly American form of ghetto: the gated community. A gated community is
defensive. Designed to keep the "others" out, it dissolves the rich web
of society into a random clustering of disconnected individuals. It turns
paranoia and isolation into a lifestyle.
Surely this isn't the America anyone dreamed of; it's a last resort, nobody's choice. It's
especially ironic since so much of the best new thinking about society,
economics, politics and philosophy in the last century came from America. Unhampered by the
snobbery and exclusivity of much European thought, American thinkers vaulted
forward - courageous, innovative and determined to talk in a public language.
But, unfortunately, over the same period, the mass media vaulted backward,
thriving on increasingly simple stories and trivialising news into something
indistinguishable from entertainment. As a result, a wealth of original and
subtle thought - America's real wealth - is
squandered.
This narrowing of the American mind is exacerbated by the withdrawal of the
left from active politics. Virtually ignored by the media, the left has
further marginalised itself by a retreat into introspective cultural
criticism. It seems content to do yoga and gender studies, leaving the
fundamentalist Christian right and the multinationals to do the politics. The
separation of church and state seems to be breaking down too. Political
discourse is now dominated by mo