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Author Topic: Member Interesting, Hair Raising, Humorous or Otherwise Unusual Experiences  (Read 6759 times)

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AGelbert

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UFOs & Govt. the Smoking Gun Evidence  :o

Published on Nov 24, 2013

A look at what the governments of the United States, England, and Belgium could know about the existence of UFOs, and studies what some say is smoking gun evidence of a web of secrecy.

UFO conspiracy theory argues that evidence of unidentified flying objects and extraterrestrial visitors is being suppressed by various governments around the world.

According to David Morrison, fellow at the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, such theories are backed by little or no evidence.

However, many well-credentialed people claim that there is an overarching cover-up of the subject by the U.S. Government. Former Senator Mike Gravel, claims that the White House is suppressing, ignoring and/or marginalizing evidence. Many generals, pilots, and government officials who have gone on record to state the same thing.

Conspiracy believers commonly argue that Earth governments, especially the Government of the United States, are in communication and/or cooperation with extraterrestrials despite public claims to the contrary, and further that some of these theories claim that the governments are explicitly allowing alien abduction. British researchers have found some evidence of suppression of UFO incidents by governments during the Cold War but have found no evidence of it having a conspiratorial nature. The motive is attributed to the governments' desire to avoid admitting that they could not explain the UFO phenomenon and its associated hysteria.

Some civilians suggest that they have been abducted, some among them saying that they were also subjected to extensive physical examinations and others adding that tissue samples including sperm and ova were taken from them. The contention that there is a widespread cover-up of UFO information is not limited to the general public or the UFO research community. For example, a 1971 survey of Industrial Research/Development magazine found that 76% of those participating in the survey felt the government was not revealing all it knew about UFOs, 54% thought UFOs definitely or probably existed, and 32% thought UFOs came from outer space.

Notable persons to have publicly stated that UFO evidence is being suppressed include Senator Barry Goldwater, Admiral Lord Hill-Norton (former NATO head and chief of the British Defence Staff), Brigadier General Arthur Exon (former commanding officer of Wright-Patterson AFB), Vice Admiral Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter (first CIA director), astronauts Gordon Cooper and Edgar Mitchell, former Canadian Defence Minister Paul Hellyer, and the 1999 French COMETA report by various French generals and aerospace experts..


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNoiiAAIzas&x-yt-ts=1422579428&feature=player_embedded

BY THE WAY, the "Belgian Wave" discussed in the above video was precisely when I saw some UFOs (in Puerto Rico!) that I have reported on here (April 9, 1990).  They must have done the grand tour of the planet of the naked killer apes and wanted to take in some Caribbean fun while they were at it. :o  :icon_mrgreen:

The following is a true story

I was in a parking lot overlooking a city watching the moon rise at about 9:00 P.M. There were about 20 other people there listening to their radios and drinking beer. I wasn't drinking. I saw this weird cloud about 5 miles away boiling like a tornado cell. It seemed to be backlit (not by moonlight) but there was no sound of thunder from cloud internal lightning. People started saying "look at that and ooooh and aaaah".


This went on for about 5 minutes and two lights shot out of the cloud at least 1,000 mph (I'm a pilot and atc at this time so I had a very good grasp of distances and speeds). One was red and one was blue. The red one headed north (I was facing east towards the cloud and the moon) and the blue one headed south for a mile or so and did a hair pin turn and caught up to the red one headed north. They grew brighter and whiter and disappeared.

It all happened in less than a minute after they shot out of the cloud. I was smoking a cigarette and was amazed at this "whatever" display of acrobatics and speed.

I heard a muffled pop like when you pop a paper bag. I looked left and I saw the first light ball. Then POP, POP. Two more appeared out of nowhere right before my eyes (no doubt some kind of interdimensional movement similar to what you mentioned and what occurs constantly in the electron clouds around an atomic nucleus).

I just stared at these majestic looking things that reminded me of a Dandelion seed Ball with clear Lucite rods sticking out. They where white and translucent, not yellow as portrayed. The center was compact. They floated south a few feet from me rotating lightly (the lateral rods were near stationary while the most forward and rear rods appeared to roll clockwise through the air two feet or so from the asphalt (the rate of roll did not coincide to the asphalt below like tire movement does). The asphalt was lit up by these things as they passed by. It took no more than a couple of minutes. Think of a feather floating in a whisper of a breeze.

Then the lead one Popped and disappeared, followed in sequence by the other two. I caught a flash of light entering the cloud miles away and then the cloud stopped boiling and assumed a typical cloud appearance. I was sorry I hadn't tried to touch one.

I didn't know anyone there so I didn't talk to anyone but people appeared pretty dumbfounded. I left a few minutes later. I've never made heads or tails of this experience. If the balls ARE energy creatures, they must have had a good time but made no effort to communicate. If they are vehicles, whatever pilots them is no bigger than a rabbit. Whatever they are, I do not think they are from Earth. It appears that there are some ETs out there that aren't shaped like us and prefer the sea urchin star shape.

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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NOW we are COOKIN' WITH GAS!   

Please excuse the reference to fossil fuels.  :P It's an old expression about valuing a discussion that has proceeded in a logical and truthful manner.  8)

WHD,
Than you. You are absolutely right that I am hypersensitive; been that way since I was knee high to a grasshopper. In the FAA people would say, that I was "too" sensitive. I would respond that I would prefer being overly sensitive than insufficiently sensitive (i.e. I don't DO insensitive).

In fact, I am convinced that YOU are a rather sensitive fellow and a genius in your own right. You figured it out and didn't buy the BAU bullshit. You knew it would you cost you to have principles. Yet you retained them. That's defined as lack of CFS by the apex predators that run the joint. I define it as doing the right thing, come hell or high water. You are there. GOOD! 
But who knows? I may be projecting NOW by cleverly trying to flatter you into taking seriously my 'making it up as I go along just to be controversial' "baloney".  But really, you know that's not the way I roll. I may be a tad on the histrionic side (cue to - it must be his "latin" heritage LOL!) but you've never seen me get too exercised about total collapse from lack of fossil fuels, have you?  I've been accused of being a tecno-fix wishful thinker more than once. Guilty!  :(

I can be incorrigibly optimistic at times. But I have never based a word I have written here or anywhere else on deliberate falsehoods, pie in the sky or any other bit of razzle dazzle rhetoric just for the fun of it; I formulate my views on evidence (I am ashamed to say even my spiritual views are formulated on evidence - useless to most other people because it is 100% anecdotal - I did NOT 'make that up as I went along' but that's another subject.  8)).

Sure, I have several bones to pick, so to speak, with so-called modern civilization, the consensus that mankind has progressed due to secular humanism and so on. I'm not happy, to put it mildly, with how I have been treated and how I have been denied several opportunities in life despite being more gifted than my peers. But, hey, you can always say that is why losers pursue Christianity, right? They get the goodies they never got here in the next life. That's MKing's view, I'm sure.

My dad agreed with it. He called me Intelliburro. He knew that I knew the score and refused, from lack of CFS, to 'play the game'  (**** can the conscience for good pay). Martyr complex, anyone? Inferiority complex, anyone? Superiority complex, anyone? Delusional fellow thinks he's hot snot but is really a cold boogar, anyone? Whatever. ::)  I sleep quite well at night, in my view, BECAUSE I tell people exactly what I think is true and exactly what I think is false in no uncertain terms. 

So, that leaves all those prudent, measured, cold blooded fine fellows that don't DO sensitive (because they consider it emotional, irrational, hysterical, illogical and so on) open to discard my "histrionics".   

But I think they are punting () BECAUSE what I say IS logical but uncomfortable to their paradigm     

What you did with Mary Shweitzer was an excellent example of punting. You are a capable wordsmith. You know exactly what I said and how I said it. I won't split hairs with you. Mary Shweitzer published credentialed research on T-Rex soft tissue (blood vessels and collagen) and hemoglobin, period. You said that was false. It was true. What the "earth is 6,000 years old" wishful thinking folks tried to make out of it is not relevant.

However, it IS USEFUL to use the creationist histrionics to undermine the credibility of the evidence in general, is it not? I'm being "hypersensitive" by becoming somewhat discomfited by being called a liar? I don't think so. If I get a rep for pushing WAY OUT THERE stuff (with your help  ;D) what does that do to my claims of ancient High Tech, HUH?

So, YEAH, in a world where being INsensitive is celebrated as favoring logic and reason, when what it actually favors is the **** canning of ethics and principles, feel free to label me as "hyper" sensitive. 

I agree that one must not get burned out on anything and a healthy outlook requires a sense of humor. Old dogs should always be prepared, ready and willing to learn new tricks. But I enjoy a good rant as much as you do.         

AZ,
I don't question the age of the rocks. I do, however, question the dating of fossils in the rocks and the man made artifacts found in the rocks. The point is we should proceed with the view that "anomalous" findings in the fossil record and evidence of high tech in ancient artifacts CANNOT be discarded just because it doesn't "fit" the Darwinian paradigm.

Yet modern science REFUSES to even contemplate the possibility that we are Devolving, even though that is precisely what any OBSERVABLE phenotype appearance and genotype whittling events due to natural selection (dogs, bacteria, etc.) provides evidence for.  Things ARE winding DOWN, not up. But that's another subject. And a sore one at that BECAUSE the secular humanists will IMMEDIATELY equate it to bible thumping "the fall of man through sin" stuff. It's just another subject that the SO-CALLED logical thinkers cannot deal with reasonably.

I know you see everything in a light and vibrations paradigm. I just ask you to look for more common ground with the other world views so that you won't be dismissed outright. If you want people to listen to you, provide some evidence they can deal with.

I have seen some really weird stuff coming out in science now. They put stretched cloth over a speaker pointed up. The cloth is flat. Then they spread tiny particles of some type of sand or dust on the cloth. Different sounds began to produce some spectacular symmetrical shapes! WEIRD stuff. But beautiful too. Then it gets really crazy. They found a frequency that matches a carving in some ancient stone perfectly. There is a lot we don't understand about frequencies in sound as well as the total electromagnetic spectrum.      That too is another subject.

Ashvin,
I hear ya. But don't you think that granite vase is pretty convincing of ancient high tech? And what about the marks on the workpieces that nobody understood until we had machines that make those kinds of marks in modern industry? That is evidence, not hearsay.

As to ET presence evidence, I agree that what we-the-people have access to is circumstantial. But here's one you will have some fun with as a lawyer. There is a tribe in Africa that science had to make up a tall tale (otherwise know as credible "scientific" speculation. LOL!) about. You see, they had astronomical information in their (strictly) oral tradition that they could not have had without telescopes. You see, what happened is that white explorers who knew about astronomy taught one or more tribal elders the astronomical information. Nothing to see here. Move along.   

The problem is that said tribe is a wee bit more into astronomy than just having knowledge of Sirius A, B and possibly C. That dog gone Dogon tribe thinks they were given the info by aliens! And that's part of their religion BEFORE they were ever contacted by Western "civilization".

I have not looked deeply into it but I know that Science is very quick to delegitimize any idea that ET has been or is here while simultaneously supporting gobs of money being spent on radio telescopes to find ET. But this "hypothesis" (whitey gave them the info) was accepted without a SHRED of proof that the tribe had been contacted and given the astronomical data.


A Toguna

SNIPPET 1:

Dogon and Sirius

Quote
Certain researchers investigating the Dogon have reported that they seem to possess advanced astronomical knowledge, the nature and source of which have subsequently become embroiled in controversy. From 1931 to 1956 the French anthropologist Marcel Griaule studied the Dogon. This included field missions ranging from several days to two months in 1931, 1935, 1937 and 1938[28] and then annually from 1946 until 1956.[29]

SNIPPET 2:
Quote

Oberg points out a number of errors contained in the Dogon beliefs, including the number of moons possessed by Jupiter, that Saturn was the furthest planet from the sun, and the only planet with rings. Intrigue of other seemingly falsifiable claims, namely concerning a red dwarf star orbiting around Sirius (not hypothesized until the 1950s) led him to entertain a previous challenge by Temple, asserting that "Temple offered another line of reasoning. 'We have in the Dogon information a predictive mechanism which it is our duty to test, regardless of our preconceptions.' One example: 'If a Sirius-C is ever discovered and found to be a red dwarf, I will conclude that the Dogon information has been fully validated.'

This alludes to reports that the Dogon knew of another star in the Sirius system
, Ęmmę Ya, or a star "larger than Sirius B but lighter and dim in magnitude." In 1995, gravitational studies indeed showed the possible presence of a brown dwarf star orbiting around Sirius (a Sirius-C) with a six-year orbital period.[47] A more recent study using advanced infrared imaging concluded that the probability of the existence of a triple star system for Sirius is "now low" but could not be ruled out because the region within 5 AU of Sirius A had not been covered.[48]
  :o   


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogon_people
 
Eddie,
Good link. By the way, there's a sunken city off of India recently discovered that SEEMS to date prior to 9,500 BC (possibly up to 32,000 years ago). It's no stone age village, either. Over 250 separate cultures have a flood narrative. That cannot be a coincidence. There was a worldwide flood probably about 12,500 years ago caused by God knows what (super nova/meteor strike/volcanism maybe?) in addition to simple glacial melting.

Considering that most of the population NOW lives near sea level, which is quite a bit HIGHER than t was back then, a huge flood back then with lots of tectonic stuff thrown in would send them back to the stone age pretty quick.

Recently they discovered that Ceasarea port, a port built by King Herod (No, he was not a fictional character. But hey, if people can claim J.C. wasn't real, they'll be throwing in Herod, David and Solomon too before long in the "fictional" category. LOL!) sank because the hydraulic concrete pier structure gradually sank into the sand base. They did not put pilings into bed rock like they do now. There was no big cataclysmic earthquake and tidal wave like the one that did Alexandria in.

There is a LOT we don't know. I just get real tired of the scientific community's assumption that, until THEY admit something is real or even plausible, we are not supposed to. **** THAT! Those people are not high priests and they sure are not basing SPECULATION about whether there were or were not humans with high tech in the ancient past on anything but CONJECTURE. Their "absence of evidence" claim is incredibly convenient in the face of the FILTER they put out there to admit something IS evidence.

They just LOOK THE OTHER WAY when something doesn't "fit". 

A great example is that dinosaur carved in a temple. It's total bullshit to claim it was just a stone carver with a vivid imagination. But they KNOW where the admission that those ancients saw dinos would lead them so they LOOK THE OTHER WAY.

In South America they found hard evidence of a tribe that is African. Their cave paintings show them fighting a giant "Armadillo" (supposedly common in South America at the time...).

GIANT Armadillo!!!? I looked at the rock painting and it could have been a dino easy. The thing was the size of an elephant with short legs. I swear they just keep force fitting new findings into their "scientific" procrustean bed paradigm. Sure, lots of good science is done. But the INSTANT something doesn't "fit", out it goes. That's not science. 

At any rate, that's why I focus on fossils, artifacts, skulls and other physical objects that cannot be ignored as being real.

Also, as a former air traffic controller and pilot, I have a lot of respect for pilot testimony and USAF personnel testimony as well. These people HATE to talk against the system. I was there. I know how they think. When they come forward, they are telling the gospel truth. It's PAINFUL for them to lie.

They are not run of the mill people. But most civilians cannot understand that. In fact, since so many representatives of the military in the top brass are such bold faced liars, people assume the underlings are the same. NOPE! In the military, if you lie, you get in deep trouble very quickly. Weird, I know. Considering they are trained to destroy without conscience. But witness testimony of ET encounters by USAF personnel should be considered HARD EVIDENCE in a court of law.

UB,
Fascinating info from that taxi driver that did some archeology. All the questions Ashvin (and all the rest of us have) have about ET are moot if we can't get "in your face" evidence to everyone out there that they are here.

But let me speculate. I have previously mentioned that they may view us as a biologist views a lion pride with tool making abilities. A male lion will kill the offspring of another male lion if he can. The biologist does not interfere.

So it goes with ET up to a point. If the lion pride is causing it's major source of food supply to go extinct, the biologist may intervene, not just for the lion pride, but for the prey species too as a matter of biosphere balance.

Either way, the motives of the biologist when dealing with others of his species are quite different from those when dealing with the animals he/she/it/we/they study. Lions are sometimes darted so they can have a dangling tooth or a broken jaw repaired. The lion has no memory of when or how this was done. Also, others of the biologist's species may just want to kill the lion to get a trophy. It's a jungle out there.

WHERE do we get the idea that being self aware and sentient makes us BETTER, NICER or SUPERIOR? What's or track record? Why do we assume that IF some ETs are around AND they have superior technology, they are going to be just as "NICE" as Homo saps are?

Stephen Hawking wants no part of them. He says we should stop trying to communicate with them because, if they get wind of our existence, we will get the same "treatment" as Columbus gave the native Americans.

So we go round and round. ET isn't going to pay the rent so why talk about it? Because the **** running the joint DON'T WANT TO HEAR THAT THEY ARE SECOND FIDDLE! That's why!

But one might say there is no evidence that they can do "stuff" to TPTB if they want to. There is. THEY, in the 60s, on film, took a MIRV (multiple independent reentry vehicle) on a missile shot downrange in the Pacific and CAREFULLY zapped it several times and destroyed it. WE didn't do that. The Russians didn't do that. Who else but ET could do that?

Again, NONE of the WHYS are answerable until they are willing to converse publicly with the intelligent tool making naked killer apes. But we have a REAL PROBLEM with TPTB going bat **** insane with their profit over planet apex predator religion. So let's keep reminding these **** that they are taking a long walk off a short pier if they keep insisting on this Wall Street insanity, not just from us, but from the new sheriff in town.

Am I making his up as I go along? NOPE. But TPTB are. Don't let them. They are lying to us to preserve their profits and power. Keep pushing for disclosure.

Finally, I am NOT concerned about getting "accepted" in the galactic fraternity or whatever. If they haven't squished us like a bug, by now, they probably won't. And I don't think the ET species are like the Skull and Bones at Yale where you have to "meet certain qualifications" to get promoted into the IN CROWD. But it's possible. We have pecking order, so maybe they have it too.



He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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My Cousin, The Movie Star With a Conscience.

He acted with Meryl Streep, Elizabeth Taylor, Harrison Ford and other top movie stars. He began in theater and went on to movies later in life.

I will talk about the stuff not published. Raulito, as he was called in the family, was a very intelligent and talented man. He could sing beautifully and he could leave rolling on the floor with his jokes. They guy was an absolute riot to be around.

Quote
I remember I was like five or six years old; I played the devil. That was my first role.

But above and beyond that, he had a heart for the poor and downtrodden in this world. He never ceased to do whatever he could to help them. But first he had to overcome the obstacles placed in his path to stardom.

The first obstacle was his parents. My old man was really tight with his old man (they were first cousins). They both had a super macho outlook on life, liked to clown around at parties, had talent for singing, playing the guitar ( my father) and telling great jokes (Raulito's father).

They were both womanizers while being strict disciplinarians with their children (quite common in Spanish culture). His old man married a rich girl (only 15 at the time!) so he was basically set for life. His wife was a devout Catholic church goer like my mother.

That made my mom and his mom great friends too. They were both stoic ladies that looked the other way while their "childish" husbands fooled around. Raulito was several years older than me and I grew up mostly in the states side so I didn't get to know him until I was around 15 when the first tragedy in Raulito's life occurred.

At the time, his mom wanted him to be a priest and his dad wanted him to be a lawyer. Raulito tried the seminary but dropped out, to his mother's chagrin. He was faced with the alternative of becoming a lawyer. Being a top student, he could have become whatever he wanted, but he wanted to be an actor.

His parents were not having THAT! It's okay to express talent in singing, dancing, telling jokes and general enetertainment purposes at parties, but upper crust Spanish society frowns on the acting profession as one for low life morality free bohemians. The upper crust does all THEIR morality free stuff out of the public view, you see. It's a scandal to have a serious boy "doing stuff" in the theater or movies. So there! 

But the excesses of Raulito's dad were creating great stresses for his mom. She was very straight laced and Raulito's dad, unlike my dad, was too damned indiscrete about his philandering.

Then Rafaelito, Raulito's young brother about my age, was killed in a car accident.  The driver and front seat passenger survived unscathed. The driver was speeding on the, just inaugurated, new expressway and lost control of the car. It slide sideways into a concrete base light pole which split the car in two. The two rear passengers were killed instantly. Rafaelito was one of them.

His parents received a life insurance payment of around $20,000. Raulito's dad (Raul) chartered a mediterranian cruise on a sailboat with an all woman crew for a month or so for about $15,000 (1962 approximate time) to "get over his grief".  He left his wife, two daughters and Raulito in Puerto Rico to get over their grief in church. WTF!!?

I am 100% certain that Raulito, who was very close with his mom and loved Rafaelito dearly, was not pleased. Raulito then made the decison to discard the desires of his old man (that Raulito study law) and decided to become an actor, even if he might go hungry doing it.

Quote
Instead of acting in court, I decided to act onstage.
   

There is something else you should know that never made the papers. Raulito's first fiance was also killed in a car accident within a year or so of his bother's death {head on collision by drunk driver). I never met her or his first wife. I met his second wife in 1987.

So, when Raulito began his acting career, he was already quite familiar with strong emotional pain. He was a method actor. If he was going to play a lawyer, he would study law. If he was going to play a hair stylist, he would work in a hair salon for a while. That's the way method actors prepare for roles. I don't know if his tragic experiences influenced him to become a method actor or not but I'm certain they indirectly helped him in his profession, in addition to making him a stronger person in the face of adversity.

Quote
We tend to think of meditation in only one way. But life itself is a meditation.

He got his (very slow) start in theater in New York City. It turns out he had done the math on the high probability of having absolutely no problems with weight gain as an actor.  ;D

Hunger was his constant companion for about a decade. He told me face to face how that went many years later (1986). I said, "You sure had a lot of guts to do that. I don't think I could have.". He just smiled and said it worked out and he would have rather died than do anything else so he just kept at it. Here's a famous quote of his about his life as a struggling theater actor:

Quote
Sometimes we used to eat once a day... chicken backs. You could buy four chicken backs for a quarter.

But he knew acting was his true vocation.

Quote
Thank God for the theater.

Quote
I knew there was something special about the theater for me something beyond the regular reality, something that I could get into and transcend and become something other than myself.

Thanks to a good (and influential) man in the USA, he managed to avoid a lot of the stereotype latino 'dumb guy' or 'low life crook' roles that are the typical Hollywood fare for minorities. Those of us who KNOW HOW IT WORKS in the USA, understand why this is done (i.e. to give most Americans the wrong idea about intelligence and ability in minorities   ). We understand that is quite deliberate. Raulito knew the score. He wasn't going to help propagandize whitey for money. Of course that made it quite a bit more difficult to make money for long time.

When he finally did hit the big time, he used his celebrity in the service of the downtrodden.

Quote
Just the fact that I've lived more, and I'm not concerned about when I am going to get my next job anymore. This business is free-lance and it's not a steady job. Younger, I would have been more preoccupied with myself.

It was a very profound experience, getting in touch with that part of us, in all of us human beings, that is committed beyond yourself to the point of giving everything you have, including your life, for other people, for your fellow man.

There are 38,000 people dying of hunger each day and most are children. And, being a celebrity, I communicate about it as much as I can.
   
When he played a Catholic Bishop that was assassinated, his mom (and mine) were ecstatic! His mom got to see her boy dressed as priest! By that time she had long been (SORT OF - see Catholic style legal separation with a promise to not remarry - she kept it) ) divorced from his dad although she would never remarry due to her Catholic religion.

Raulito put his heart and soul into that role. When he is ranting in the movie, it reminded me of hearing  my dad (or his dad) go on a tirade of righteous indignation (but my dad and his really had no grounds to do so - they were good actors too! ).

The movie was banned in El Salvador because it told the TRUTH about how Predatory Capitalism "does what it does" there. Raulito was dead serious in agreeing with what his character's role was saying. It was an  easy role for him to method act into because he shared the same ideals.

Quote
I have a very deep care for Latin America, and, of course, for what was going on in El Salvador.

His dad died in a car accident while in a drunken stupor in the late 1980's. I went to see him in the hospital. He was brain dead. They pulled the plug on him after a week or so. The guy just could not stop the heavy drinking and womanizing. So it goes. :(

But don't get the idea that Raulito was this morose, serious ranting type (like me!). This guy could make a joke out of ANYTHING! That look of his when he puts on that sly smile and looks to the one side like a naughty boy enjoying an inside joke is a TRADEMARK inside our family!  ;)  We all do it!

But of course, he did it better (pictures at the end of the article will illustrate "the look"  ). 

Quote
You have to have the right atmosphere, really be in the right mood to really fully enjoy a Cohiba.

A cigar is as good as memories that you have when you smoked it.

Maybe it's like becoming one with the cigar. You lose yourself in it; everything fades away: your worries, your problems, your thoughts. They fade into the smoke, and the cigar and you are at peace.

Why pay $100 on a therapy session when you can spend $25 on a cigar? Whatever it is will come back; so what, smoke another one.

I even smoke in bed. Imagine smoking a cigar in bed, reading a book. Next to your bed, there's a cigar table with a special cigar ashtray, and your wife is reading a book on how to save the environment...


Don't get the wrong idea from his joking. He was quite militant about protecting the environment.   

Raulito became a multimillionaire movie star.

With his fame he was able to pick roles that defended the downtrodden and the environment.


I am certain he angered quite a few murderers in the service of profit over people and planet.    ;D

When he was doing "Kiss of the Spider Woman", he had to get skinny as a rail for his part in prison. He also had to kiss a man.  :P Around that time (1987) his second wife had their second child. He gave a party at the Berwind Country Club in Puerto Rico for the family. I guess it was a kind of a "home town boy makes good" thing. He and his wife showed off the new baby boy that was about six months old.

As is the habit of menfolk worldwide, later on, and with a few drinks in us, we gathered around him at the private bar in the area he had rented for the party. I asked him what was it like to work with Liz Taylor and Richard Burton a long time ago. He said they are quite different off screen and were quite friendly with him throughout the filming. They treated and respected him as a colleague. 

Then one of my cousins (A.A.) looked at him rather crossly and said, Raulito, what's this business of kissing an HOMBRE? Raulito said, "It's just acting. It was part of the role".  A.A. pondered that a few seconds, ran his hand over his head and said, "Well, then I guess it's okay, but I sure wouldn't do it!". Everybody laughed and Raulito lifted his eyebrows and gave "the look". Then we really roared!

My brother Larry, always interested in the money angle, commented to Raulito that it must be great to be rolling in the green with all that movie money and asked him what his living expenses were. Raulito quoted a figure that amounted to several hundred thousand a year. Larry asked, "How come so much?". Raulito said he supported several movements for people and the environment that were quite costly.

He added that his lifestyle also required very expensive hotels when travelling or vacationing to keep from getting mobbed. He had to support a team of handlers that took care of fan mail, security, threats, scheduling and, of course, his agent. It goes with the territory of fame.

The last time I spoke to him was in January of 1990. He called the funeral parlor where my mother's body was being viewed and I happened to answer the phone.

I realized then what a hassle it was to be him on certain occasions when my "daughter" and one my nieces rushed to the phone when they realized Raulito was on the phone. They were begging me to ask him to send them an autographed picture. Such lack of decorum. It was their grandmother's funeral and my mother's funeral. So it goes.

I apologized to him and passed on the request. He said, no problem and not to worry about it. He would send the pictures to Sophia and Renee. I thanked him for the condolences, promised to pass them on to the others and we said goodbye.

A funny guy with a huge heart that I will always remember.


His name is Raul Juliá. The last name is NOT pronounced Júlia (like Julie). The accent goes on the last letter. 


Raul Juliá quotes source: http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/r/rauljulia320711.html

Biography:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ra%C3%BAl_Juli%C3%A1

He could play a good guy as well as a bad guy and do great comedy (Movie pictures below). 



Obit with a tribute


THE LOOK    



The Adams Family Character





THE LOOK    















Bishop Oscar Romero played by Raulito

Quote

It was a very profound experience, getting in touch with that part of us, in all of us human beings, that is committed beyond yourself to the point of giving everything you have, including your life, for other people, for your fellow man.  Raul Juliá Arcelay

« Last Edit: February 21, 2015, 05:38:51 pm by AGelbert »
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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You can have everything in the universe. You can have it now. It is yours for free, and it is unconditional. This is God's covenant with every living thing that was ever born.

A seed of a giant redwood falls on the forest floor. It sticks a root into the ground and begins to consume. How much does it consume? As much as it wants! There are birds flying past my window right now going leaf to leaf, branch to branch, eating the seeds, berries, insects, whatever they want. How much are they taking? As much as they want!



You know, this subject is very interesting to me.

First off, any backsliding Christian from East Texas can tell you that this is straight from the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 6:25-34.



(I still like the King James. It's what I cut my teeth on.)



25 Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?

26 Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?

27 Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?

28 And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:

29 And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.

30 Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?

31 Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?

32 (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.

33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.

34 Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.



So....that's Jesus's take on it. He said that.....right after the part where he said you can't serve both God  and money. If you believe the New Testament is an accurate account.

And far be it from me to argue with Jesus. It's only some of Jesus's rabid fans whom I take issue with.

However, it seems to me that although man is not fundamentally different from the other animals, he does have one characteristic that influences his behavior that other animals don't. He has the brain power and the moral judgment to make decisions about what he should or shouldn't do.

Like...recently I was out on the stead with my dogs. They hemmed up another raccoon. The heeler had him treed at the base of a cottonwood tree that had collapsed into the creek, and he was barking to beat the band.

The fox terrier closed in for the kill from the water side. She was just about to take the first bite out of the coon's ass when I showed up, and she had her gorge up and no amount of hollering got through to her. I had to pick up a rock and bounce it off her flank to get her attention.

It's just their nature. They're bred to hunt. She didn't need to eat that coon to keep from starving. She wasn't even hungry. I could have let them kill it, but there was no reason to allow that. If I'd needed the meat, it would have been different. The coons have gotten thicker on the ground because of the deer corn I put out. So it was more or less my fault the coon was there in the first place.

Maybe not the best example, but what it amounts to is that plants and animals....every species but man (as far I know) has absolutely no conscience regarding killing, or whether to eat all or just some of whatever food is there. They just follow their natural instincts.

Maybe that's what's meant by the myth of the Fall from Grace, getting thrown out of the garden. We do have the knowledge of Good and Evil.

So...it seems to me that while it is okay to take what I need from the earth, that it's just plain wrong to take anything and everything I might want. That's what's gotten us into all this trouble. Too many people taking, and taking , and taking.

When our hunter-gatherer ancestors roamed the world, they could take what they wanted...and the environment and the other species recovered immediately. Now that isn't the case. We do take what we want, most of the time, and there just isn't enough left to go around anymore. I wonder what Jesus would have to say about that.


Eddie,
That's interesting about your dogs and the raccoons. I observed the same behavior as a kid with a snapping turtle and several frogs in a wash bucket. It killed them all even though it was not hungry. And it was my fault because I put that snapper in that wash bucket with all the frogs that could not escape.

We are the caretakers of this planet because we are the only self aware species. That's called Stewardship in the Bible and I agree with it. There is good stewardship and there is bad stewardship. Those are moral choices. As to the alleged "subjectivity" of morality that knarf claims, I resolved that issue long ago.

The Native Americans had the seven generation impact of whatever they did as the litmus test of morality (i.e. good stewardship). Translated to science speak, a decision by a self aware being that will result in the reduced viability of the biosphere for about 300 years is an immoral decision.

Hence morality involves each and every choice we make that impacts other Homo SAPS and ALL other life forms in the web of life called the biosphere. That is NOT a subjective issue.

Immoral behavior degrades the biosphere; moral behavior enhances it. Yes, that means that, in certain cases, what is immoral for civilized folks and several religions (including Christianity) is probably not really immoral when all is said and done.

Of course that can set up a slippery slope where genocide can be "justified" because a tribe was killing off the butterflies or some such ridiculous pretzel logic.

But aside from legalese jargon and fast and loose use of language to justify conscience free predation, it's pretty obvious what not the morality of doing anything that craps the biosphere for 300 years while we live means.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Quote
But I will give you one point in your logic that cannot be refuted. If the Libertarian style government was the norm, large armies, navies and air forces, as well as nation states, would not be funded.

Thanks AG, Lets face it Agelbert, no political party or system is perfect, you and I can find faults with all of them at any time.

When I hear we gotta stop these evil disgraceful wars and get the Government out of things they are not supposed to be doing, like spying on their citizens, turning the country into a militarized war zone, buying tanks and bazookas for local police, killing civilians with drones my ears perk up. To me Libertarians under a Ron Paul are not even close to being ideal, but just a step in the right direction is all.

Your point about a rebirth of MORALITY is the right point, that's what we need for sure. Unfortunately I'm not that much of a romantic to hold my breath waiting for that to come about, not without there being a RUDE AWAKENING first that is.  :-\

GO,
You are most welcome. Morality and no nonsense mandatory ethical behavior enforced by law is what we need. And yep, like you, I'm not holding my breath either.  :(

Here's a video (below) that I recommend. I believe these Dr. Strangeloves behind this global experiment (funded with our money   ) will get a VERY rude awakening when a HUGE chunk of Greenland ice sheet slides into the ocean, despite their feverish, and pseudo scientific, efforts to save fossil fueldom's ASS. Then there is going to be HELL to pay when it comes out that their experiment made everything WORSE. 

And speaking of "Rude Awakening", I read that newsletter for almost a decade. In fact, the Libertarian that runs it (forgot his name  :-[) was the guy that made that statement about a monarchy being the best and most stable form of government if you have a benevolent monarch. He also said, as early as the year 2000, that gold was the "Trade of the Decade". He was right!

But after 2010, he said that gold was more of an inflation hedge than anything else. I agree with that too. But I'm not an investor so it really does not make much difference to me. He is of Irish descent from Maryland. He lived in France for a while and then went back to the USA. He's got a ranch in Argentina which is totally off grid that he used to spend a lot of time on. I have not kept up with what he is up to for years.

Here's that video. It will knock your socks off!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPfm1ljfwkU&feature=player_embedded

One more thing. The grim reaper made a low pass at me when I got up today (before I had posted or read anything so nobody here was the cause    ). I was feeling quite well, was engaged in emptying my bladder, when I got real dizzy and started to get nausea. I finished up as quick as I could and walked into my bedroom where my wife was talking to me and kneeled down on the floor. She saw I was doing the Syncope two step and became very concerned that the pacemaker battery was failing (It's supposed to last ten years and I'm a little over eight). I managed to go to the computer room (while my wife was telling me to lay down on the bed NOW! ), grab my pulse watch (pilots love to read the gages!  ;D) and go back the few steps to the bedroom where I laid down. My wife said I was very pale.  :o  :P  I checked my pulse and it was at 61. I kept checking it and it dropped to 56, then 53, then, within seconds (an ETERNITY for the pacemaker software!) up to 62.

The pacemaker is supposed to kick in at 60. There is NOT supposed to be a delay.  After a few minutes my pulse got up to between 65 and 70. I did not actually faint and the nausea went away within a couple of minutes along with the dizziness so the pacemaker IS working, but I felt rather strange the rest of the day. My hands stayed cold until I exercised a few hours later. My wife has been hovering over me. I showed her where to push on my sternum for CPR if the agelbert batteries crap out. She was not a happy camper. I marked the date so the pacemaker clinic can look at "episode" data when they dump it on my next check up.     

I'm okay now. Cheated death again. 

Nearer my Lord, to thee.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Intimations of Mortality
Off the keyboard of Surly1
Artwork: Anthony Freda

Originally published on the Doomstead Diner on April 5, 2014

"Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde;  And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee."

?John Donne



It was a milestone week. I turned 65. Like many, I never thought I would reach this age. Yet this very week I learned that several childhood friends did not. Three have passed this year, two of whom played significant roles in my early life and then drifted away, like we do.

Allow me to beg your indulgence from taking the pulse of doom to indulge a few personal observations.
We children of Happy Motoring, were raised on the Flintstones and the Cleavers as a vision of family life, and on the Jetsons as a vision of a cornucopian future. As the son of an electrician and a homemaker, I was raised on trade union Democrats values– economically liberal, socially conservative,  and expected that I would somehow take my place in a world much like theirs. Uh, no. By the time I left college, that world that no longer existed.

During my lifetime it’s all changed– the New Deal social contract has been rescinded, and the prescription, we’re told, is austerity for workers and tax breaks for corporations and the one per cent.  In the 1960s a single earner could pay the rent or mortgage, clothe and feed a family, buy a car and maybe have a little left over for a vacation. Now two earner (or more) households have become the norm,  and the vast majority of paychecks yield far less earning power than that of a union electrician in 1965.

I recall a lesson from fifth grade.  We learned about the “melting pot,” complete with an illustration of people of all nationalities and races happily jumping into a pot to make soup. The point being we were a nation of immigrants, bonded together in the notion that, “out of many, one:” E Pluribus Unum.  Today armed, angry white men patrol the southern borders in search of brown faces without papers. A nation built on immigrants no longer welcomes immigrants, unless they bring an independent fortune or skills favored industries need.

I was the second of my family to enter college, and my luck to enroll during the height of Vietnam. I went in patriotic, full of received wisdom and civic virtue,  and enrolled in ROTC, earned a scholarship and was prepared to enter the Regular Army as an officer.

Then came the USS Pueblo incident, and then My Lai. Those episodes shattered closely held beliefs and preconceptions. At once, my college experience transformed from 13th and 14th grade to learning how to think, perhaps for the first time. What, you mean our government would leave Lloyd Bucher and those sailors to rot in a North Korean prison? What, you mean kids like me uncritically murder Asian women and children? What, we’re not the good guys? I began to question everything that I had been taught, and from there, everything changed.

On reaching adulthood and employment in which the demands were on mind rather than body, my style would be to work hard, play harder and cram as much as possible into what would doubtless be a few short years. To the surprise of all, those stretched on. My MO was that while I might not be the brightest or most talented, I was a grinder who would succeed through sheer dint of effort and persistence. 80 hour weeks punctuated with long evenings of riotous relief, and, uh, excess? A way of life. For a while.

It took many years to realize that what I did was not who I was. There were victories; and there were losses.
The losses give you perspective, and remind that the bell eventually tolls for all of us.

And with that ringing in my ears, I now approach the final laps of a career in media, including photography, video, film and writing. A time to think of What’s It All Been About, and What Have I Learned Along the Way? Having made every possible mistake along the way, committed every sin short of murder, and been slow to learn from experience, repeating most mistakes several times, a few simple principles  have emerged:

1) Kindness. Always be kind.   Easy to lose track of when we are young and on the make, in competition with others and serving those all-important ego needs. We get sucked–or leap– into the matrix and forget what’s really important, which are relationships.

2) Don’t criticize, condemn or complain.
Dale Carnegie makes this his first rule of human relations. In college I played interior line, and wrestled. My job was to knock other people down.  After a while the workplace, as in life, one eventually begins to learn that not every adversary needs knocking down, and not every obstacle is an adversary- some are opportunities. Some learn this essential truth later rather than earlier.  It’s amazing how relationships change when you stop being critical of others, and thus engage their own self protective mechanisms. Duh.

3)  Live in the Present. In my 20s, I encountered a slender tome by Baba Ram Dass  entitled, “Be Here Now.”  As I recall, it was about the importance of being fully present in the here and now.  It resonated. How many of us spend time rehashing old wounds, or worrying about the future? There is a reason that the “Recitation of the Grievances” made famous by Jerry Stiller’s Festivus celebration on Seinfeld was so funny– because it’s so true.  Whenever I return home, I become 15 again as my 86 year old mother opens a trunk full of 60-year-old grievances. Was it Voltaire who said, “My life is been filled with one catastrophe after another, most of which never occurred?”  We spend a lot of time worrying about uncertainties, when the effort is better placed on creating a desired reality.

So we Boomers came of age and enjoyed the blessings of cheap energy and a dollar backed by nukes and military force. Now the energy is getting more dear, harder to extract and the dollar is closer than ever to losing reserve status, all at a time when good jobs remain hard to find.

My life has been modest in material terms, but has been enough. Enough to enjoy a working class standard of living, a decent home and raise a daughter.  It’s a life I’ve chosen, with no apologies or excuses. What brings me to the Diner each day is the realization that it’s all doomed,  and I will miss it when it’s all gone.  Between the neocons eager to fight World War III down to the last drop of your grandchildren’s blood,  and the crony capitalists and their bankster allies  determined to bleed the last drops of wealth out of the near empty husk of what used to be America’s middle class, it appears that those at the top of the pyramid have determined that the world needs to shed about 6 billion “useless eaters” and redundant population.  What do corporations do when they have excess workforce? They lay them off.

Prepare to be “laid off.”

Quote
The clouds that gather round the setting sun

Do take a sober colouring from an eye

That hath kept watch o’er man’s mortality;

Another race hath been, and other palms are won.

Thanks to the human heart by which we live,

Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,

To me the meanest flower that blows can give

Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.


 –Wordsworth,  Intimations of Immortality
                                 
           
 
People aren’t stupid. Most people, from urban liberals to country rednecks, can sniff the zeitgeist  “Survivalists” have been around since the 70s. Nowadays, more people are turning to “prepping”, including many on the far right, who have repaired to fortified compounds in Idaho, etc., the better to wait out the zombie hordes and/or the black helicopters. (Bracing, is it not, to think that the Mormons will be the subset of Americans best positioned to transition through the Zero Point?)

Karma is a ****. If one reaps what one sows, our portion today is the inevitable bitter harvest of decades of government lies and perfidy, from the Warren Commission’s “magic bullet” to the 9/11 cover story to the lack of faith in the very function of government due to corporate capture.  People are sick of being lied to; people are sick of seeing their unresponsive government toady to lobbyists, while ignoring the needs of ordinary citizens. So they’re planning for it all to end, and quite literally taking matters into their own hands for when it does.

One of the great blessings of my dotage is having found the woman that shares my home and life.  I met Contrary quite literally in the streets during the height of Occupy.  Casual conversation developed into a friendship that then exploded into something quite unexpected.  Had anyone told me that I would be getting married after decades of living as a single man, I would have doubled down on that action and covered all I could get.  Well. Surprise, surprise. I now live with my best friend, confidant and a veritable Scheherazade, a wellspring of both stories and common ****ing sense.

As a child, my grandmother had ice delivered by horsedrawn dray, and lived to see man land on the moon and the end of the Soviet Union. Considering my own lifetime, in which cheap energy draws to a close, I can see our current mode of living will not survive our generation. We have been reduced to a “precariat,” a term used by that servant of hell Alan Greenspan.  Prospects for our young people of gone from bad to worse.  Our grandchildren will shake their heads in disbelief when they hear stories about the way their parents used to live. 

When the dollar loses reserve status, the American lifestyle will be reduced to that of the average Croatian today; couple that with the significant and increasing likelihoods of environmental collapse, water shortages or nuke plant meltdowns, and the prospects darken even more. The good news is that the holders of real wealth, those who own property, metals, real assets will survive substantially intact. The only people who will suffer are those who are paid in, save or spend dollars, and who **** away their earnings on luxuries like food, rent, heat, and medicines.

So near the end of it all, it looks as if we’re at the end of it all. Makes a fellow wistful. What matters is that we make such common cause as we can, treat one another as well as we are able, and greet uncertainty with grace and dignity.  And be grateful that that bell has not yet tolled, and that the grave has not yet opened for that dirt nap.

Intimations of Mortality

Surly1 is an administrator and contributing author to Doomstead Diner. He is the author of numerous rants, articles and spittle-flecked invective on this site, and quit barking and got off the porch long enough to be active in the Occupy movement. He shares a home in Southeastern Virginia with his new bride Contrary in a triumph of hope over experience, and is grateful that he is not yet taking a dirt nap.



Surly,
Thank you for your honesty. That, in and of itself, is rare among Humans.   

I wish I could say what you said about past experiences. I can't. When I look back on what happened and when it happened and what I did, NOT KNOWING what was actually happening, to further compound my errors in life, I am actually glad it is almost over. I was mostly a stupid chump.   

My only accomplishment in life has been that, after God knocked some sense into me, I am willing to die to avoid doing the wrong thing. Doing the right thing is to "Trust God and lean not upon your own understanding".

Everything else is missing the mark.

Forgive my arrogance and lack of humility, but I consider that the only achievement that has any merit whatsoever while our soul occupies a body. Of course, most here don't just disagree, they get a great laugh about anyone ignorant enough to believe in a personal God and salvation through Faith in Him, practiced ONLY by obedience to Him. 

Unlike you, Surly, a person who has demonstrated with his life and example that working for the good of the whole is FAR MORE IMPORTANT than working for the good of the individual, most humans are convinced that providing for their biochemical needs and surrounding themselves and their loved ones with possessions is the only prudent course of action for a Homo SAP. Looking out for number one and number one's offspring is IT, as far as they are concerned, no matter how much pretense of working for the good of humanity they may espouse.

IF IT ALL ENDED HERE, THEY WOULD BE JUSTIFIED IN THEIR EGOCENTRISM. BUT IT ONLY STARTS HERE... 8)

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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I wish I could say what you said about past experiences. I can't. When I look back on what happened and when it happened and what I did, NOT KNOWING what was actually happening, to further compound my errors in life, I am actually glad it is almost over. I was mostly a stupid chump.   


My only accomplishment in life has been that, after God knocked some sense into me, I am willing to die to avoid doing the wrong thing.   Doing the right thing is to "Trust God and lean not upon your own understanding".

Everything else is missing the mark.

My friend, thank you for taking the time to read this little screed. I often think no one reads anything I write.

When you say, and I quote,

Quote
I was mostly a stupid chump.

... you must realize that I have spent the bette part of a lifetime in that role. Every lesson I learned, I paid retail plus 30 for, because I come from a long line of hardheads to whom no one can tell anything.

I identify with what you have written about wanting to leave a little something behind for your wife, as I do now too, waiting to spare her waiting in line at the plasma bank.

One of the great blessings of this misspent life is time with my daughter. She had a rare day off today and spent it hanging out with me. She's 23 going on 50, whereas I have friends who decry the immaturity of their 50 year-olds. Counting blessings and feeling grateful...

Quote
retail plus 30

Same here. The latest "installment" is still ANOTHER fast one by my ever loving family and the Courts. The judge got together with the bank after dragging her feet for nearly two months to authorize "mediation" proposed by the bank.

The judge finally figured out why the bank was playing dead (in theory, mediation would have eliminated conditio juris for a bank auction of the house by a payment plan for the tiny debt of $5,912 on a building worth $700,000 plus). What they ACTUALLY wanted to accomplish was to have an excuse to charge ME with contempt of court and make ME a rebel so the foreclosure could proceed. The court "mediation authorization" order made it CLEAR that anyone who didn't show up can be charged with contempt.

This is not normal in that type of a court order. In fact the rules of procedure in all court orders ASSUME that anyone ordered to a proceeding can be found in contempt if they don't go.     

I smelled a rat and said so to my wife. She said it didn't make sense for the widow, who now had a lawyer, to not pay the $5,912 so the bank would get taken out of the picture. At that point, with the house paid for, a sale of the property could proceed without the widow (or me) getting shafted.

My wife did not think it possible that the widow could be so stupid as to go along with the fraud perpetrated by the bank, the judge and my siblings. So I hoped for the best. At any rate, I did not think it prudent to travel 1,500 miles one way to get my ass handed to me. My brother is not a nice guy. Life is cheap in Puerto Rico.

My brother (with his power of attorney from all my other siblings), the one that has been ABSENT, along with all the others, from all court proceedings since day one and the widow (my stepmother) showed up with ZERO intention to pay anything.

Their job was to DEMONIZE ME in the time tested motto of the Court System (Vox Populi, Vox Dei - "the voice of the PEOPLEMOB is the voice of GOD"   ).  I didn't go on April 9, 2015. The next day I called the mediator to see what the results of the mediation were.

The "mediator" told me over the phone that the case had been returned to the judge because "not all parties were present" and "other things she learned that were confidential and I had no right to know". I calmly said that as a party to the lawsuit, I though I had a right to know. She repeated that I had no right to the information on the motion she had sent to the judge and "other things she learned that were confidential". When I said the bank had only been interested in negotiating with the widow, she said that was not her concern. She said that if I had a complaint, I should get a lawyer and tell the judge.

I was taken aback by her tone, which was arrogant, angry and dismissive. I was very low profile and low key throughout the conversation and never raised my voice or spoke rapidly. When I asked her to calm down, she almost screamed into the phone that she was "calm". I then realized what had happened (the whole "mediation" thing was a setup) and, in total defeat, said, "God bless you", She angrily responded, "AND YOU TOO!". I said bye but she had hung up already. 

SO, I'M the bad guy now, will be found in contempt of court followed by the house being auctioned AND have whatever fine (sanción) the HONORABLE judge slaps me with, OF COURSE. deducted from the pittance that I might get from the auction (Most likely, I will end up OWING the court money after my entire inheritance is stolen from me - stealing from me wasn't enough; they have to punish me for wanting justice too.).  MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.   

They are very prudent in their own eyes. So it goes.

And ANYONE STUPID ENOUGH to state that I could have avoided the contempt charge by showing up, does not understand that a crooked system has OTHER OPTIONS in readiness if that one isn't "effective" in shafting the target. So if YOU KNOW WHO shows up to defend the court system, I have a GIANT FINGER ready for him if he dares to do so.

I told my wife I should have never submitted all the legal motions. She said that everything I stated was true and regardless of how crooked the judges, the bank, my family and the widow are, telling the truth about this carefully planned and orchestrated fraud was the right thing to do. Somebody read it and somebody learned something about how greed and evil works, hopefully, to avoid being victimized by it in a similar fashion.

God will judge them in His Court. There is no corruption there.

Sorry to be so down. I'm glad you can be grateful. Good for you.


 
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Robert Todd Lincoln

Quote
Robert Todd Lincoln – “Bob” to his family and friends – was dubbed the “Prince of Rails” during his “Railsplitter” father’s 1860 campaign for president, after a visit to this country by England’s Prince of Whales. Robert was a prince that would never ascend to the throne.

He was the oldest of the four children – all boys - of Mary and Abraham and the only one to reach maturity. He lived a long life. Born in 1843, he died in 1926.
http://clevelandcivilwarroundtable.com/articles/lincoln/prince_rails.htm

This is an interesting article about Robert Todd Lincoln, son of Abraham Lincoln,  who was present at the SEGREGATED  :P 1922 dedication of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.
Robert Todd Lincoln

by Mark Bushnell, a historian and writer who lives in Middlesex, Vermont.

SNIPPET 1:

Quote
During his tenure as secretary of war, Robert got blood on his own hands, Vowell asserts, having been ultimate responsibility for a botched expedition to the North Pole. Under the auspices of the Department of War, a 25-man scientific research team had started for the pole the same week Garfield was shot. The men established a base at the pole and waited in vain for resupply or rescue.

Some historians blame Robert’s lack of interest in the expedition for its inadequate provisioning. The starving men eventually tried to head south. Only six of them survived the journey, which they did by eating some of those who did not.

Robert Lincoln and others tried to cover up the cannibalism by claiming that the bodies of the dead had been cut up for bait.

SNIPPET 2:

Quote
Few people knew about other connections between the Booth and Lincoln families. A couple of years before the assassination, Robert Lincoln had been moving between moving train cars when he slipped.

A man reached out and grabbed Robert’s coat, saving him from being crushed between the heavy train cars. “That was a narrow escape, Mr. Booth,” said Robert, having immediately recognized his savior, Edwin Booth .


Robert Todd Lincoln, harbinger of presidential doom

Robert Todd Lincoln is a very interesting character to me. You know that he was the one who had to deal with his mother, who ended up institutionalized. Her situation was tragic, but it must have been living hell for him to deal with her suicidal depression and bipolar craziness.

You know that he probably destroyed a great deal of her correspondence, and also refused to allow the release of his father's papers until after his own death in 1926. At that point, a lot of books about Lincoln has already been written, many of them not too accurate.



Eddie,
Yes, Robert hired Pinkerton guards to follow his mom around and keep her out of trouble before he finally took her to Court (with all the testimony from the Pinkerton fellows to help put her away, of course). But after she was institutionalized, she won her release In Court. They never spoke again.

ALL her brothers fought on the Southern side in the Civil War. ALL her children except Robert died young. It's a wonder she didn't go crazy sooner. I think it was Robert's Responsibility to take care of her. I think it was wrong to try to "put her away" as is the American wont with "inconvenient" family members that are "embarrassing" the family. Robert had the money and the time to care for his mom with paid help AT HER HOME. Had she been violent to herself or other people, I would agree that she be institutionalized. But she wasn't. So it was an example of a self centered attitude so prevalent in this society.

I'm not trying to judge him. I simply don't agree that relatives can be stuffed into institutions when they are losing it.  I think that is irresponsible, but quite modern and accepted DARWINIAN, apex predator, survival of the fittest, egocentric and conscience free behavior.

I have BEEN THERE where Robert's mom was. It is WRONG to shaft a relative because of a mental crisis. But that is what my family did when I had a crisis. They never stopped demonizing me after that. That is how I got my disability retirement from the Federal Government.

I'm not crazy. I never was. I simply had a crisis. This society is an unforgiving piece of ****, Eddie.

Robert Todd Lincoln was NOT being charitable or responsible by trying to off load his responsibility to care for his mom. She had suffered FAR more than he had. Please take that into consideration.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Having had the experience of having a bipolar mother myself, I guess I can't help but feel sympathy for the son, although my brothers (after the death of my father) were the ones who did most of the heavy lifting, had to deal with Mom's mental illness, much more than I did.

Well then, you are indebted to your brothers. Our parents did the heavy lifting to raise us. We owe them any and all heavy lifting they require later in life.

That is why, despite my dad's successful efforts to deny me my mother's inheritance, I never tried to sue him.

I did not like that greedball. He ran the household I grew up in like a permanent Army boot camp. As soon as my feet were big enough, all I ever got were G.I. shoes because they were the cheapest. Christmas "presents" were mostly clothing. Other clothing and sneakers was mostly from the thrift shop (second hand from other military families that donated clothing).

But ALL my dad's clothing, except the uniforms, was top of the line (See the Dictator complex). He had silver embroidered ties while he complained about how fast our hair grew ("forcing" him to give us our crew cuts) and how we were eating too much and outgrowing our clothes too quickly. The guy was a permanent disher outer of 24/7 guilt trip psychological abuse so we would feel guilty for being such moochers and grateful to his royal fascist highness for all his "sacrifices". He actually complained to me when I was a teenager that I "made too much noise" when I was pis sing in the toilet!

OF course he never missed a Sunday golf game with his personal golf clubs, bag and cart (he NEVER paid a caddie). And he was SO PROUD of that HAPPY FAMILY of 7 children that he took such GREAT CARE OF.  ::)

But he did keep me fed and clothed while growing up. Yes, he was an abusive fu ck, but, I know my responsibilities. He died at the ripe old age of 95 in 2008. I hope he extracted his head out of his self centered ass before he died. RIP.  8)
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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You don't think it is a good thing to be allowed to think for oneself, and to be able to pursue one's own path to one's own goals? What point is there to survival if only groupthink is allowed?

The problem is that Individualism leads to EXTINCTION, not SURVIVAL.

Assuming this is true (which I don't, but I'll get to that), I ask again, what is the point of surviving if you are not allowed to think for yourself?

Quote
Individualism deemphasizes your dependence on the Group to survive.  By becoming Individualistic, we fractured the society and lost our group understanding of our dependence on the rest of the environment to support not only our own species, but all species.

I guess you haven't noticed my posts about Green Libertarian Socialism. If you had, you would be aware that I am aware of the danger that unrestricted individualism has to the environment, that as I just stated (to Eddie) that I am not in favor of a Ron Paul-like like libertarianism. Any individualist who is not aware of his dependence on the biosphere and of his group to survive is a dangerous idiot.

On the other hand, if the group does not allow individualism, then it does not deserve to survive.


Quote
Individualism is the precursor to Greed, because it allows you to justify your own well being at the expense of others in your community.

I dispute this, in that there was Greed long before individualism became an ideal. Greed, and other sins of groupthink societies (like worries about losing face) arise because the groupthink honors the rich and famous. And that has been around as long as history. Individualism, however, never became an ideal until the modern era -- in fact, modernism can just about be defined as the rise of the ideal of individualism.

Quote
The individual can only exist though if the community exists.  So the individual has to be subservient to the needs of the community, which in fact includes all the other living creatures on the earth as well.

Yes, the individual needs the community, but the community also needs individuals who can think outside the box so that when conditions change it has a way to adapt. So how do we reconcile these needs?

My answer is green libertarian socialism. The social structure needs to be set up so that basic needs of everyone are met, yet in a way that prevents the rise of a nomenklatura, and that preserves the biosphere. And does not require everyone to chant slogans from the Little Red Book. To achieve this will take a lot of thinking, but I think it can be done, but almost certainly not realizable until enough of the thinking class sees it as the only viable alternative.

Ka,
Well, YEAH, Green Libertarian Socialism does take care of circumscribing individualism to behavior that doesn't harm the community/biosphere.

But RE might claim that the individual IS TOTALLY subservient to the community (i.e. the biosphere) under Green Libertarian Socialism. Me too  . The reason for that is that the buttons that are pushed inside our gray matter when somebody talks of "individualism" are DOING WHATEVER YOU WANT, WHENEVER YOU WANT TO DO IT. As you said, that IS being an idiot.

But THAT is how our society defines "individualism". Your nuanced and ethical definition that differentiates from the individualism (which includes boundless greed) of Nero, Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan and so on is, as you have said before, a hard sell for the average Libertarian (or average American, for that matter).

THAT was the type of "individualism", I believe, that RE is referring to. That is the type of "individualism" that you consider only an idiot would have.

I agree. But the Green Libertarian Socialism definition of "individualism" is not part of the common parlance.

Thinking "out of the box" has always been a function of the wise, regardless of whether they were groupthink type societies or the more dysfunctional, "everyone for themselves" modern social structures.

Are you saying that wise people ONLY began "thinking out of the box" when individualism was given free rein in society? If so, I would beg to differ. That premise will not hold water.

As a matter of fact, modern society is HARDER on "free thinkers" than those with the "calculate seven generation effects before making changes" world view.

We ARE NOT allowed to invent ANY device that challenges the Corporate Status Quo. IF we try, we get suppressed, bought or bopped. The rigid control of Homo SAP thought and endeavor is WORSE THAN NEVER. And the celebrated people TODAY are the greediest IDIOTS the world has EVER witnessed. Paulson, Buffet, Koch Brothers et al put Nero to SHAME!

Your belief in the necessary contribution that thinking outside the box is, of course, is valid. But linking it to "individualism" is incorrect. Thinking outside the box comes from wisdom, not from studying the rules to see how you can break them and make a profit. SOMETIMES the "new widget" that makes somebody some big bucks improves social conditions.

But, by and large, the ones that actually do, are suppressed before they get to market. We have a destructive inertia in our brand of "Capitalist individualism" BECAUSE only the "celebrated" greedballs actually CAN act as individuals. And when they do, which is most of the time, they act like the destructive idiots that they are.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

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You don't think it is a good thing to be allowed to think for oneself, and to be able to pursue one's own path to one's own goals? What point is there to survival if only groupthink is allowed?

The problem is that Individualism leads to EXTINCTION, not SURVIVAL.

Assuming this is true (which I don't, but I'll get to that), I ask again, what is the point of surviving if you are not allowed to think for yourself?

I could speculate on a lot of reasons, like the point is to love others, or to observe the world around you and take joy in it etc.  However, since you speculate that Individualism didn't exist back in the distant past, what was the point then of surviving?

Quote
Individualism deemphasizes your dependence on the Group to survive.  By becoming Individualistic, we fractured the society and lost our group understanding of our dependence on the rest of the environment to support not only our own species, but all species.

I guess you haven't noticed my posts about Green Libertarian Socialism. If you had, you would be aware that I am aware of the danger that unrestricted individualism has to the environment, that as I just stated (to Eddie) that I am not in favor of a Ron Paul-like like libertarianism. Any individualist who is not aware of his dependence on the biosphere and of his group to survive is a dangerous idiot.

I did miss those posts.  Just from the title though, "Libertarian" & "Socialism" in the same sentence is an Oxymoron.  I've never met a Libertarian who was a Socialist and vica versa.  It sounds like a kludge to me.

On the other hand, if the group does not allow individualism, then it does not deserve to survive.

See above.

Quote
Individualism is the precursor to Greed, because it allows you to justify your own well being at the expense of others in your community.

I dispute this, in that there was Greed long before individualism became an ideal. Greed, and other sins of groupthink societies (like worries about losing face) arise because the groupthink honors the rich and famous. And that has been around as long as history. Individualism, however, never became an ideal until the modern era -- in fact, modernism can just about be defined as the rise of the ideal of individualism.

How do you know Greed predates Individualism?  If you define Individualism as beginning with modernity (when did that begin?) you might make that case, but IMHO you had Individualism going right back to the beginning of Ag.  Kings, Pharoahs etc clearly acted Individually making rules for the society.

Anyhow, while Greed likely existed in some form before Individualism, it really took off with this ideal.


Quote
The individual can only exist though if the community exists.  So the individual has to be subservient to the needs of the community, which in fact includes all the other living creatures on the earth as well.

Yes, the individual needs the community, but the community also needs individuals who can think outside the box so that when conditions change it has a way to adapt. So how do we reconcile these needs?

My answer is green libertarian socialism. The social structure needs to be set up so that basic needs of everyone are met, yet in a way that prevents the rise of a nomenklatura, and that preserves the biosphere. And does not require everyone to chant slogans from the Little Red Book. To achieve this will take a lot of thinking, but I think it can be done, but almost certainly not realizable until enough of the thinking class sees it as the only viable alternative.

I never said that Individualism should be eliminated, only that it must remain subservient to the needs of the Group.  In the words of Mr. Spock:


That's just CFS.  Or as Spock would say, "Logical".

RE

 
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

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Actual footage of MIT undergrads working on this technology under laboratory conditions.

[embed=425,349]http://youtu.be/nxMRpql7Ook[/embed]

I first you don't succeed, open another Guinness.

 ::) I not only bring out the curmudgeon in you, I bring out the snarky side as well.  ;D

In 1969, yours truly attended sea survival school at Homestead Air Force Base. We had a lot of fun and learned all sorts of cool facts like "Drinking urine is not recommended because of the high salt content" and other gems of CFS that downed fliers might not possess. After some fun and games (falling 60 feet along a wire attached to a parachute harness that splashed into a pond where we had to "release the chute", swim under a floating chute to prove we wouldn't get tangled in it, and then climb on a raft.), they gave us a taste of the real thing in Biscayne bay.



We would, attached to a parachute, be towed off a floating platform and launch into the air like an aircraft taking off from an aircraft carrier. After parasailing a few minutes, they waved a red flag from the speed boat. At about 300 feet above the waves, I hit the release of the tow rope. Then I carefully opened the chute release rings as I floated down (you have to stick one arm over each riser in case you pull the ring release when you open the cover).

Then you watch the horizon so you can yank the rings about 20 feet before impact. You do this because, once you are in the water, your weight is off the chute and it is an absolute BEAR to get the rings to release the chute. Downed fliers were drowned this way by either getting tangled in the chute OR having a strong wind drag them for miles, face down, over the water surface.

Once in the water, we all gathered on an 18 man raft and were picked up by a chopper (we had to swim away from the raft to get fished out). We could NOT touch the lift harness until it was in the water (they said it would shock the **** out of us if we did -so you swim at it as it descends and frantically swim away when it is coming too close. LOL!).

But, to make a long story even longer :icon_mrgreen:, we did the condensation ball moisture capture thing to get drinking water way back then.  It's part of the issue equipment on pilot survival gear.  8)

The MIT invention is NOT that. The MIT invention is a bonafide bit of Renewable Energy technology that will help people in third world countries and help Americans as we transition to third world status too. But you know that.   



Quote
The finished prototype is small enough to fit in a tractor-trailer and includes photovoltaic cells to supply the electricity. The system, when fully operational, can supply the basic water needs of a village of between 2,000 and 5,000 people, MIT officials said. Although the prototype was more expensive, Wright said the team is hopes to lower the costs of a village-sized unit to about $11,000.   

Such a lower-power system is useful mainly for treating brackish water and not seawater, which contains far more salt. But the prototype now being tested could handle water that contains salt concentrations of up to 4,000 parts per million, meaning it would work in about 90 percent of India’s wells, Wright said. Seawater’s salt concentration averages about 35,000 parts per million.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/05/08/1383429/-MIT-created-a-solar-powered-machine-that-turns-saltwater-into-drinking-water
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Agelbert NOTE: I am congratulating fossil fueler MKing on the purchase of a Ford Fusion Energi EV.

Well done, MKing.   


I am relieved of the thought that you were going to "take advantage of low gasoline prices"  by buying a hummer.  ;D

I've already owned one. It was okay. 15 mpg around town, got as good as 19mpg on the highway. Used it for one family christmas trip. It was a bit tight for 4 people, the dog, and presents and stuff.

I had a brief job parking cars at the Park and Travel long term airport parking when I first moved my retired ass to Vermont. Having spent most of my working life inside a reinforced concrete windowless building (Enroute Air Traffic Control Center), I figured this was a chance to be outdoors 24/7 and get paid for it!

I confess to the gas guzzling pleasure of driving cars too (at least in 1996!). I got to drive Mercedes diesels, a hot Porsche and all kinds of vehicles I would have otherwise not driven because they are high price tag items. We even had that EV that GM destroyed on behalf of the fossil fuel industry parked there once. I didn't get a chance to park that one, though.

I got to drive a Hummer once. I was surprised that it had that that HUGE separation between the driver and the passenger in the front. I did not find the hummer to be anything but a rather clunky riding truck suitable for midgets with Napoleon complexes. How tall are you, MKing? (just kidding!  ;D)

Back in 1981, when you made your discoveries about how to deal with the status quo, I made a few discoveries of my own. I had a Ford F-150 super cab pickup that got about the same mileage as that hummer you had. :( I was working at Syracuse Tower (not where I could see outside - I was in automation at the time).  I had owned that pick up since 1977 and I was not a happy camper about the mileage, given the price shock in 1979. I would  ride a bike with a tiny roller drive motor on it to work during the summer (freezing my arse off at night because it used to go down to 45 in summertime Syracuse, New York back then. Even at 15 mph, 45 degrees is no fun at all for an 8 mile ride).

Of course in winter ( any part of the year that was not summer in Syracuse - only Buffalo gets more snow in the lower 48 USA than they do!), my fondly labeled "Arab buster" ;D ( I was a Republican back then!) was out of the question.

Just before the strike, Jeff Hall, the PATCO union rep, became all friendly with me even though previously he (along with most people there) had no use for me whatsoever because of my "low class" Hispanic heritage. I smelled a rat but did not say so. I simply told Mr. Hall that I had signed a contract when I hired on specifically pledging not to strike.

The strike came in August. The telephoned threats came right after that. At work, I went back to working airplanes instead of the computers that helped work airplanes. We worked 50 to 60 hours a week.

The union folks decided the spic needed a lesson. My F-150 crapped out. Courtesy Ford charged me about $1100 for a major overhaul. I specifically told the mechanic to give me an oil sample BEFORE the overhaul.

He "forgot". All I got from him was the scored cylinder sleeves. I took those to my insurance agent (vehicle vandalism repair costs were part of my homeowners policy).  He said, I'm sorry sir, company policy does not allow payment for damages if no oil sample is submitted and we get proof from a lab of adulteration. But thank you for insuring with Allstate. 

I'm sure the "bad memory" of the mechanic at courtesy Ford had nothing whatsoever to do with the one thousand plus people march at the Syracuse airport terminal building SUPPORTING THE STRIKERS (that included a lot of employees from Courtesy ford...).

So we both learned a thing or two in 1981.

I'm sure my experience does not surprise you, considering the steps you take to avoid getting the short end of the stick, so to speak.

I bring them to your attention, not so you will say, "No sh it Sherlock, where'd you get the first clue?", but as proof that some people, quixotic though their behavior may appear, refuse to go with the "fu ck your buddy to stay ahead of the game" Social Darwinist program.

Of course, folks like me often end up living in manufactured homes and driving 20 year old gas guzzlers. I simply do not consider the outward accoutrements of  materialism a true measure of success.

Lucid said,
Quote
I think it's healthy to marinate on your mortality from time to time.  It helps keep things in perspective.  I read an article a while back that was written by a hospice nurse.  She said the number one thing that people regret on their death bed is that they didn't live life how they wanted to...they lived it how society wanted them to.  They wished that they had done more of the things that they wanted to do. 

I think there is a lot of wisdom there.  We should all live as if we will die tomorrow, and we should live that way everyday.

http://www.doomsteaddiner.net/forum/index.php/topic,559.msg84109/topicseen.html

I agree. and because I live my life, particularly since 1981, as if I might die tomorrow (or today), I have lived my life the way I think is the best way to live it, regardless of what society wants or expects from me.

When I go to my grave, I will have some regrets, but they are all from my behavior prior to my 1978-1981 epiphany.

You may say, as any materially successful chap might say to my "sermon" about the joys of principled poverty  ;D, that I'm just rationalizing the shaft job I have gotten from society because I didn't have the intestinal fortitude to overcome life's " normal Social Darwinian challenges", as the materially successful chap DID and DOES. 

But I might counter that it is the materially successful chap that is doing the rationalizing (see what Lucid said.  8)).
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

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Quote
Ashvin and K-Dog, the most important issue of our time is the existential threat we face from CO2 pollution. The other empathy deficit disordered activities humans are foolishly, greedily and stupidly pursuing need to be addressed. Those activities produce habitat destruction.

It is a mistake to think that I disagree.  The assault on humanities future is being fought on many fronts and these fronts mutually reinforce each other.  Consider that agriculture as we currently know it is dependent upon massive quantities of fossil fuels.  The use of fossil fuels sends CO2 pollution into the environment in a relentless assault.  Modern agriculture is not sustainable, it will kill us and it is madness to pursue the unsustainable.  It has become a matter of life and death.  With the current world population humanity must change ways or perish.  There is no longer any other way to make it through and stop the CO2 pollution that will trigger our demise but by changing ways.  It is all interrelated and everything man does under the sun determines the outcome of humanities future or the lack of one.  There is no singe greater contributor to CO2 pollution than animal agriculture.

K-Dog,
In addition to my scientific training, which I got AFTER the following life work experiences, I learned along the way to prioritize in life and death situations.

If you don't, you freeze. I'm an experienced pilot. I'm also an experienced air traffic controller. We are trained to not fool around with competing, interrelated issues. We are trained to prioritize one or more emergencies. We temporarily DISCARD the lower priority, even if it means people will die.

I've seen big tough guy students freeze at the controls of an aircraft. I've slammed their hands turned white on the controls and yelled at them to get with the program. It usually worked. But if I, the flight instructor, would not have been there , they were dead meat.

I've seen air traffic control trainees about defecated on their drawers when they lose the picture. I've pulled the plug on a supervisor working 25 plus C141 aircraft around Grenada during Reagan's mini-war there because the guy froze up. And he had more time as an air traffic controller than I did!

So don't think because you are so analytical and reasonable, you are not in danger of IRRATIONALLY making things worse by prioritizing our biosphere degradation factors incorrectly. If you want to give up, then I will tell you straight out that you are making a mistake. If you want to draw some false equivalence with meat and CO2 from fossil fuel burning, then you are like some student I had once who forgot to pull the flaps up before starting a take off roll in a touch and go. The torque from the lighter load caused him to ground loop. He was the brightest student I had, but he thought he knew it all.

He was his own worse enemy BECAUSE the instant it dawned on this smart ass that he was losing control, he panicked.

Are we communicating, K-Dog?

There are a LOT of big talkers here that I know will sh it on their drawers when the enormity of our situation dawns on them. For now, most of them are happily bathing in that river in Egypt. When they can no longer do that, it will be sad to watch. THAT is why I rant and rave here trying to get people to pull their heads out of their comfort zone asses. THEY are putting themselves and their families in DANGER.

The fact that eating meat causes SOME CO2 pollution does not mean that it has an equal priority with our duty to do whatever we can to FORCE every fossil fuel corporation into bankruptcy and every executive pushing that poison into penury and/or prison.

THAT is the priority. We do not have ANY chance if we don't stop that. Did you read what I just posted about the methane in the Arctic? It's fun time up there with methane soon. Do you think going vegan is going to stop that horror? Good luck with that.

I understand priority of duties. People who don't prioritize in an emergency situation contribute to the clusterfork, make things worse by their lack of clarity and cause people who look up to them for advice to give up.

I CHOOSE to remain focused on the MOST important issue. And it torques me off to NO END that I get such little support on that.

Expect your scattergun approach to be labeled back door nihilism. The fossil fuelers will applaud while they gear up to scream for a geo-engineering bit of taxpayer fleecing. And all along we will going merrily along down to hell in a hand basket.   

What you are advocating is similar to a pilot adjusting the elevator trim tab to keep the proper back pressure on the control yoke while ignoring the engine out procedure. Our ENGINE is the biosphere. Burning fossil fuels is what is stalling OUR participation in it.

If you don't get that, then I'm done trying to convince you of it.
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

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Tip #5: Have Fun!


Five Tips to get the most out of your technology. Tip #5: Have Fun! - You can, and if you choose to you'll see that it helps make tips 1 through 4 even easier!



https://askleo.com/tip-5-have-fun/#comment-376349


Agelbert COMMENT: Thumbs up for Tip #5, Leo.

Since I programmed a mainframe back in the 1980's (yeah, I'm ancient!), I learned to have fun with technology and accept that continued learning is sine qua non to having that fun. When you stop trying to keep up, it starts to get NOT fun to catch up a few years later.

The machine I programmed back then was a 32bit machine. It "only" took about 15 years or so  for the 32 bit machines to reach the general populace. If Motorola had been the winner of that race instead of Intel, it would have happened a lot sooner. But that is water under the 'sore subject' bridge.

Back then, even the definition of a  "half-word", "word" and double-word was in dispute! A "word" for us was 30 bits with the added 2 bits for parity. IBM had other ideas and they won out.  I bring all this up because I programed in assembler, not high level stuff. When you do a "double Shift left" (i.e. a type of divide in binary), in our assembler language (Sperry-Univac ULTRA -Universal Language Translator Assembler), 60 bits were shifted.

Everybody agreed about what a bit was. We all were familiar with the "bit bucket" where all embarrassing programing efforts were sent. But IBM decided what a 'byte" was and what a "word" was. Some guys had the TRS80 and programmed it so a bit of confusion ensued. The Boolean instructions that accessed a "word" or a "half-word" for buffer packing or math manipulations  needed some type of standard.

This is a quote from my Technology Dictionary published by Radio Shack in 1987:

Word: a collection of bits which the computer recognizes as a fundamental information unit and uses in its operations. Usually defined by the number of bits contained in it, e.g., 8-,16-, or 32-bit word.

Word Length: The number of bits in a computer word.

Byte: A group of adjacent bits treated as a unit. Eight bits is a common byte size.

END OF (ancient) QUOTE

Back then there  was all sorts of hype about the "coming advances" when computers would move from 8 bits to 16 bits. I was not impressed. If they could build a 32 bit data transfer (and 64 bit buffering!) missile tracker and modify it for air traffic control back in the 1980's, I didn't see why they couldn't make 32bit personal computers. Motorola was working on it. IBM and Intel  were taking their time.

Well, we are up to 64 bit handling motherboards with 128 bit buffering video cards (I may be behind here because I am not a gamer). I am certain that much wider data path technology (that DO NOT heat up motherboards like gaming computers do now) is available.

Leo, I have kept up and it has been fun to do so. But since I am, like you, a bit of a geek, I think it is much easier to do. Most people cannot get the "nuisance factor" out of their minds when dealing with technology. So I do appreciate your efforts to make all this stuff more "user friendly" to the user.

Thank you..
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

 

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