Relationships and recreational pills

I went to cheerleader practice the other day, and I heard some of the parents having a discussion about a friend's marriage.

I'm pretty vocal about my views of America's War on Drugs, and prohibition.  I'm sure that many people who see my posts about such things just smirk and think, "He just wants to get high".  I won't lie, if it were legal to buy weed, I would.  But that is seriously the LEAST of it.  There are a couple of beers in my fridge, and half a bottle of tequila right now, they haven't moved since last year.  The tequila was left there by the X, who's been gone for nearly two years!

Prescription drug abuse now causes more deaths than heroin and cocaine combined! Marijuana isn't included in the statistic, because marijuana is not toxic, and does not cause death, at any dosage.

According to the LA TIMES, illicit and prescription drugs now cause more deaths annually than automobiles.

"The rise in deaths corresponds with doctors prescribing more painkillers and anti-anxiety medications. The number of prescriptions for the strongest pain pills filled at California pharmacies, for instance, increased more than 43% since 2007 — and the doses grew by even more, nearly 50%, according to a review of prescribing data collected by the state."

"Oxycontin, Xanax, Vicadin and Soma lead the pack. One relative newcomer to the scene is Fentanyl, a painkiller that comes in the form of patches and lollipops and is 100 times more powerful than morphine."

In my research on the matter, I've found articles and talked to many people whose relationships had and SSRI med as a key player in the demise of those relationships, with one spouse wholly unaware of the true side effect of their Other's recreational pill habit.  I once was asked to try a Xanax, and it made me sleepy.  I couldn't understand what anyone saw in them, and never thought about it much after that.  As it turns out, it helps a lot of people, but a select few it makes them very hard to get along with, or murderous, in some cases.

I'm sure people think I honk this anti-prohibition horn too loudly and too often, but drug use has touched my life from an early age. My oldest brother was kicked out of the house for smoking weed!  OMG.  This relegation of drug distribution to the black market is wrecking the lives of far too many people. I don't want my kids raised up in this system of shame, punishment, ignorance and rhetoric that sent me off into life half-aware, unprepared and ignorant of something that was potentially so destructive.

putting Special Creation behind us

I often wonder about the God and the universe, really I do.


I have come to believe that something will be discovered that explains the origin of the universe. I don't ascribe to the Big Bang Theory, because I think there is another, natural explanation that science is yet to discover. Because the universe doesn't just pop into being... but that's my opinion.

But assuming current models are the best we have to work with, I find myself accepting that the "Big Bang" is the best I've heard from the Science side. The Universe is expanding, and eventually all matter will evaporate into space... and there will be "nothing" again. And presumably, another Bang.

But many people believe that God made everything, in some cases, only 6,000 years ago. My understanding of the Universe and my layman hillbilly's understanding of scientific discoveries tells me this is not so. I was at the river today, and the bluffs have layered, sedimentary rock formations which require millions of years to form. Corals can be seen in the stone that were deposited many millions of years ago.

Once Believers thought the Earth was the Center of the Universe. People were burned alive by the Church over this point of disagreement... but eventually, Science won the day, and now we know we're in a solar system, on the outer spiral arm of a star-formation, orbiting a supermassive black hole, the spiral galaxy we call the Milky Way. We also know that our galaxy has hundreds of millions of other stars in it, and that beyond our galaxy, there are more galaxies in the Universe than there are stars within our own galaxy.  We're so small, and insignificant that we don't even deserve to be noticed by any truly advanced species from another star, let alone be the ultimate creation of a God.

So the religious people of this century are going to have to be brave, and acquiesce that the universe really is Billions of years old. And that there is something to this Evolution stuff, the proof is in every cell of our own bodies.

It is so incredibly difficult for me to imagine that a being who was capable of creating all of the Universe, would then worry about whether or not I'm checking out my neighbor's wife?  Why make all that vast creation, magically in the middle of things?  Just to  leave the illusion of the existence of the passage of over 13 trillion years according to Physics and Astronomy? Why is there a fossil record to further cause us to doubt...

And why would an infinitely wise being, after creating all those other stars, and worlds, more worlds capable of supporting human life than there are grains of sand on a beach, then go over to one planet in particular. Way out in the boondocks, of a mediocre galaxy, in the middle of nowhere in the Known Universe. And then hunker down, to watch a single species of primates. Why would bring into being a host of  very tall fairies with bird wings to help him keep a tally of their wrongdoings, and tell them how to behave. Why the Devil to trick the people into breaking the rules, so they would burn eternally.  Why would He watch them kill one another over books, and imaginary lines on the ground, and skin color. And judge them and torture them eternally for temporary transgressions?

It's as if the rules are set up to make sure to punish as many people as possible. not only did he start the Universe with 13 trillion years on the clock, leaving behind all the physical evidence necessary to not believe in him. But he watched as thousands of different religions sprang up, and some having "moral" teachings that gave them "reasons" to rob, kill, steal, torture and enslave other people who don't believe in their holy book. Only one of the books is True.  The rest of them, if you believe the lies in them, you'll be tortured forever for being so stupid as to believe in the wrong one.

I simply cannot imagine this to be true. If there is a God, all he did was make some stuff and some rules and he spirited away to his next project, or he's watching the whole universe to see what happens, in a scientific, dispassionate way. Like the zoologist watching lions eat a zebra alive.

I find it infinitely more likely though, that there is a natural explanation, that Science has yet to discover, that will someday tell us where all the stuff came from. My personal theory is that it's always been there, in one form or another.  But one thing must happen for us to do this. Everyone needs to accept that the Sun is the center of our solar system, and that life happens all over the Universe, and IF there is a God out there, he's not watching us to judge our behavior or interested in tricking us into believing the wrong interpretation of the wrong book, or origin of the universe or life, so he can torture us for ever and ever, amen.

Science, love and wonder

I'm one to ask "big questions" like, what is Love, for example. I have put quite a deal of thought into it, as it has run through my life like a bull in china shop. The path of destruction some of my partners have left still aren't cleaned up completely.  I thoroughly enjoy deep contemplation, and discussion about such things too.  It's one of the passions in my life.  When my marriage disintegrated and my family became fragmented, I found myself needing to understand why people behave the way they do, and I went looking for some answers.  I have come to understand that we're merely the most social and talkative of the social primates, and I'm becoming something of an amateur primatologist.In my discussions with people about "being human" I often hear people who feel that understanding love as a biochemical process robs it of it's wonder. I don't feel that it does at all.  I have felt love, in small doses since I came to this understanding, and to be honest, I have appreciated it more now that I understand better, what's happening.  It's a difficult thing to explain though.  The "feelings" are the same, whether you think they're some mystical energy that moves through you, or whether you think they are caused by hormones and neurotransmitters.

Take sunrises for example. My natural god-given eyesight isn't all that great at a distance. But through the wonders of science, I can get glasses. I can see the sunrise much clearer, and in far greater detail, thanks to science.

Do the glasses make my experience of the sunrise a lesser experience or greater?

If I were to reason that understanding the science of love ruins the experience of love, and then extrapolate that back to the sunrise, the sunrise would look less magnificent to me, than it does to someone who doesn't need glasses, who is ignorant of the properties of the electromagnetic spectrum, who has no comprehension of the atmospheric affects on light which cause the color shifts of our star's light, when it is low on the horizon. Also, modern man, with his understanding of the Sun, as a star, about which the Earth orbits, and spins on it's axis, would have a reduced experience of the sunrise, than an ancient man, ignorant of the science of a sunrise, who thought it was a god, in a chariot.

A "bio-mechanical" understanding of being "human" doesn't change anything about life other than the words you use to describe it.  A shade tree mechanic who can't read, and doesn't know the names of the parts, can still fix a car as surely as a certified mechanic.

Being a primate is no different than being a human, it's merely more humble, you cease to be a special creation of mystical forces, and become a special creation of the forces of nature. It's different words for the same thing.  The difference between them is that with science and primatology you understand why things are this way, with "mysticism" you see it as more artistic. If you paint a picture with a paint-by-numbers approach, or whether you do it freehand, given a high enough resolution, you wind up with the same picture.

I'll never be a special creation again, I'm simply a talking primate. I have one life here on Earth and I can guarantee you one thing, If I ever "execute my love subroutine" again, I won't be riding the wave like some teenage surfer who doesn't know what causes the waves.  I will enjoy it more deeply, and more thoroughly, than people who refuse to see science as science, and insist on being something magical, rather than accepting the fact they are simply a talking ape.  I'll be aware of my shortcomings, where they will see the unknown. I cannot see how admitting that Love is a biochemical reaction with the evolutionary purpose of causing deep attachment in order to preserve the species, makes it any less "magical" of a feeling when you're feeling it.  In fact, to me, it makes it far more incredible and wondrous, that it is the way it is, created by ancient, evolutionary forces, than if it were "poofed" into being by some invisible magic man, a few thousand years ago.

Do you think the oceanographer who specializes in wave formation enjoys surfing any less than a teenage pothead? Understanding the formation of waves versus "feeling them" doesn't make surfing any less fun.  I've done the love thing as a "stoner" high on neurochemicals and riding the waves without understanding what caused them, or when they were going to end, several times now, and they all ended poorly.  I don't want to waste the next time on chance and magical notions.

If being "truly a man" means returning to an understanding of life where I have to be something better than the rest of the critters on my planet, with a magical spark in me that defies explanation, then I'm afraid I'll simply be an ape for the rest of my time here.  And I'm perfectly content with that situation.  If there is one thing my 45 years have taught me, it's that there is nothing special about me. I'm made from the same stardust as everything else around me, and that's special enough for me.

Black History Month

Once again we find ourselves in February. It's been designated as "Black History" month since 1976. Before that we had Negro History Week, as far back as 1926, according to my cursory research.

Over the course of my lifetime I've gone from white trash trailer park kid raised by a father who by most measurements would be considered a bigot. There was only two things he liked less than the black race, Jews and Taxes. However, he was a "good man" on the inside, he was just raised in an age, and environment that left him with poisonous beliefs. It didn't help matters much that his holy book also had enough racial material in it to "back up his beliefs".

I never could get in on being a racist full bore, though I must confess that I took on enough of the behavior and language to avoid ridicule from my peers and family. But as I grew older, and matured, and lived my own life, I gathered my own data, and observed things with my own eyes. And I find myself today literally unable to be racist. I may have a touch of "culturist" to me, but I understand it's the environment that creates people who behave poorly, in groups, not human instinct.

I have come to another point, just recently. I was watching some History Channel stuff this month and also having Facebook and Topix discussions concerning such things as religion, evolution, race and others, and it dawned on me, now that I accept evolution, and now that I accept that my distant ancestors came out of Africa, it dawned on me that MY ancestors are black, if I go far enough back down my ancestral lineage.

So in honor of Black History Month, I'd like to proudly proclaim my personal pride in my own black heritage. All of us have evolved from common ancestry, and we are all family.

The Abortion Discussion (revisited)

I have often found myself discussing abortion over the years. I've never had a conventional view on the subject. I've never fallen in line with a "democratic" or "republican" party line on the issue.

I mean, what about non-consensual sex, resulting in pregnancy? How does this fit into "every fertilized egg is a life" or "it's a woman's right to choose" First off, you don't want to bring incestuous offspring into the gene pool. It isn't good. I say in this instance, perhaps even late term, with extenuating circumstances.

Or, what if the child has a detectable, severe mental handicap, or physical one. What about congenital diseases that make for very short, uncomfortable lives? Perhaps after we can cure these things, it will become a moot point, but until then, it's a valid consideration when bringing a new life into the world.

On the other side of the coin, at what point does it become immoral to "kill a child"? After a month, you can't tell it's human yet. Two months into the deal, and you can tell it's at least a primate, and since it has no hair, you'd guess it's human. But by the time you get into month three, there is no mistaking that tiny being as anything but human.

Fingers, toes, eyes, mouth, tongue, ears, brain... it's all there by the beginning of the 12th week, or 3 months roughly. At this stage, I have to start siding with the "conservatives". Unless you didn't know you were pregnant, if you let it go this far, and there isn't anything wrong with the "fetus"...

At that point, I don't know whether or not it's "moral" do abort a child anymore. Before this point, it goes from weeks 1-4, it's just some cells, to weeks 5-8, hey that looks kinda weird, around week 9 it starts looking ape-like, and by week 12, THAT'S A BABY! But still, it's only human in physiology at this point. It's brain is not very developed at all, probably less complicated than a rat's brain even.

(on left is 8 week old is web-fingered and legless; on right is 12 week old, with legs and regular fingers and toes)

A recent study has pegged a new milestone though. At week 20, or so, the brain starts going through cycles that are very similar to ones that occur in the adult brain. At this stage, I'm saying it IS a human and to willfully end a viable child at this point should be considered murder, unless there are extenuating circumstances. And then we have another milestone at week 22, that's the youngest preemie to survive incubator care.

Brain cells start sending signals early

Just because you don't WANT it isn't good enough reason. Not to be crude, but if it wasn't non-consensual, you should have not been having vaginal intercourse if you weren't ready for a child.

Breast Cancer Cure ?

Schedule 1 drugs are those drugs which have "no medical use". In this group we have things that used to be prescribed, by doctors, before the "government" made them illegal. Heroin used to be over the counter, if you can believe that. But when it was, people didn't go to the dentist to get pain pills, they just stopped by the pharmacy on the way home, and got some, then made an appointment to see the dentist the next day, or they had some in the medicine cabinet. Cocaine was the same way, some cocaine powder rubbed across the gum ends pain rather quickly... and keeps you up all night.

But the pill companies found out ways to make synthetic versions of these things, and they needed a way to get the old, patentable stuff off the market.... so they lobbied congress. Would you believe that the top three contributors to the Partnership for a Drug Free America are the Alcohol, Tobacco and Pharmaceutical industries?

Marijuana may turn out to be the most insidious member of the Schedule 1 list. "Recent" studies are indicating that marijuana KILLS CANCER.


Marijuana Kills Breast Cancer - NBC News

Marijuana Kills Brain Cancer

Cured: A Cannabis Story (A film by David Triplett)

I call it "recent" because scientists have had an inkling of this fact for nearly 40 years, but legal studies could not be made because of marijuana's Schedule 1 status. As early as 1974 active ingredients of marijuana were shown to kill cancer tumors. KILL them! Recently the American Medical Association has recommended that marijuana be given a green light for research.

Approved Conditions: Cancer, glaucoma, HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis C, ALS, Crohn's disease, Alzheimer's disease, cachexia or wasting syndrome, severe and chronic pain, severe nausea, seizures (including epilepsy), severe or persistent muscle spasms (including multiple sclerosis)., the list of maladies that the ingredients of "weed" helps is rather lengthy. Let's be honest, if the plant were discovered tomorrow, every producer of medicines on the planet would be scrambling to synthesize the active compounds. But it's illegal status prevents any research.

I can't help but wonder how much longer this can go on. Currently 25% of Americans have access to medical marijuana, there are 20 states with pending legalization and medical laws... hopefully, sooner than later, people's lives are hanging in the balance.

Stupid Compact Florescent Bulbs!

Another comment from FB turned into a blog entry....

@Donna, we would just need to be more responsible "adults" than we are now. We'd have to actually take those pesky dead CFL's back to the store, and the stores should have a box for them to be taken for recycling. I know that's such a tremendous bother, to have to put a light bulb in a bag, and haul the insufferable thing all the way back to Wal-Mart and drop it in a box by the door. And I can't imagine all the hassle it would cause for Wal-Mart to have an employee move the box to the back of the store at the end of the day. And the Garbage Corporations, bless their poor souls, they would actually have to BUY A TRUCK and HIRE some moron who was only smart enough to drive a truck and pick up garbage, not a worthy, college educated person. And they'd have then find some way to get that truck full of light bulbs to a DANG RECYCLING PLANT, those immense wastes of private corporation time! And they'd have to do the unthinkable, dole out some more precious money to some more igorant morons who just aren't smart enough to do anything better than change broken light bulbs back into working light bulbs... That would be such an immeasureable waste of our time.

Instead we should keep using incandescent bulbs. I mean, let's just use some math and illustrate how stupid this whole thing is. A 100watt light bulb is used for on average 10hours a day let's say.

100 watts time ten hours works out to 100w times 10 hours times 365 days.... that's (calculator helps) but it's kinda no brainer if you write it out 100x10x365 and realize that "converting to kilowatts from watts is just dividing by 1000. We get a measly 365 kilowatts a year. That's all! at a national average of about twelve cents 365 kilowatts only costs around 45 dollars a year. So what!

How much could a stupid CFL that costs like $5 compete with a bulb that only costs 50 cents? That's a no brainer too right? I mean, how long does a CFL last anyway, on average like 8,000 hours, and a regular incandescent bulb lasts 2,000. So one CFL only lasts as long as 4 quality regular bulbs! that's .50 x 4 = $2

so if a CFL is twice as expensive as the same light Incandescent when we take life of the bulb into account!

That means that the CFL would have to use $22.5 electricity just to break even!

so let's do the math for the stupid, environment polluting CFL! the old technolgy is totally going to KICK BUTT. GO Edison! WOOOO yeah babay.

let's see, to get a light equivilent for a 100w bulb we need at 23watt CFL.... well, i see some easy math. that's 23%. So 23% of 45 is $11. So the CFL Actually saves money. Well dang, they're so inconvenient that it's worth the $11 not to have to make a bunch of jobs or be troubled with not just tossing them in the trash!

Not to mention that mercury in the CFL when you chunk it in the trash! I mean what are the leading causes of mercury in America after all. A 23w CFL has a whopping 2 milligrams EACH. And there is no way I'm going to be inconvenienced with all the trouble of taking it BACK to Wal Mart. And I don't see any reason to create a bunch of jobs handling all the stupid bulbs that would be work that was beneath Americans anyway, we'd wind up having to hire a bunch of economic refugees from the Depression in Mexico so we wouldn't have to give the ignorant Americans who couldn't go to college those low jobs. If we hire Americans, they'd have to give them HEALTH INSURANCE... Jesus! What's next, poor people don't need that stuff, they're just a step above a friggin Mexican right?

I mean how much mercury does an incandescent bulb have, ZERO!!! Am I right?

And how much mercury is in the coal we use to make the electricity? Approximately 0.0234 mg of mercury—plus carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide—releases into the air per 1 kwh of electricity that a coal-fired power plant generates. That's all. So that hundred watt bulb using coal for energy only causes .0234mg times 365kw for a year, which is..... calculator

uh oh.....

that works out to 8.5mg of mercury in the environment!!! That's crazy talk, I better check the math again.

... nope, it's right. But we have to take into account the CFL's mercury from the coal... don't want to be unfair! 23% of 365 times .0234mg mercury... that's 1.964 grams of Mercury, plus the two in the bulb! So that's ... well dang. CFL wins again! I'm starting to feel stupid.

so not only does the CFL save $11 a year, it puts half the mercury in the ecosystem, and it would put a quarter as much if I could just be bothered with returning the bulbs where i bought them so they could be gathered up.

I'm not just being facetious here. I went through this mental exercise about 6 years ago, when I switched every bulb in my house to CFLs. Since then I've only had 7 bulbs burn out, and they're all sitting in a box, waiting for me to responsibly dispose of them.

They actually last far longer than 8,000 hours, and most incandescent bulbs last far less than 2,500 hours, so my math in this example is heavily skewed IN FAVOR of incandescent bulbs.

That said, LED's are the true solution to the problem. No mercury in them, and they use only 1/10th what an incandescent uses! They cost 30+ dollars at the moment, which won't be so bad when they iron out all the bugs and get the to last the 50,000 hours they're shooting for. At 50,000 hours life, compared to an average 2000 for an incandescent bulb, and using 1/10th the electricity, they could literally cost $70 each and we would break even.

Changing our ways is never easy. We as a species are resistant to change, it's one of the things that has helped us survive, but it's also been one of the things that has caused a lot of problems. Neither the Jews or the Romans wanted to listen to Christ, and we all know what problems that caused, because people didn't want to change.

We have to responsibly think about these things and take the whole picture into account. Making judgments about things as trivial as light bulbs based on emotion and not reason can not only be detrimental to our bank accounts, but our environment as well.

I guarantee you the electric companies, and the coal companies want you to keep using incandescent bulbs!

The Birds and the Bees (and the bats too)

There is also a big problem with the bats in America. I'm sure most people could care less about bats, but there are entire regions of the country that are loosing one of the largest consumers of mosquitos in the food chain, brown bats. They're dying from a fungal disease that migrated to America on the dirty boots of caving tourists from Europe.

A whole chink in the food chain is about to come loose. The food chain isn't like a bicycle chain, where each link only has one connection to the rest of the chain. Think of it more as a pile of cheap gold necklaces that have been stirred up, until there are all kinds of knots, big with many connections (mosquitos) and places where a link may only have two or three connections (ebola, it's so lethal most links that touch it die out within hours!)

Bats and birds play a huge role in the control of mosquitoes. HUGE. One bat will eat up to 1000 mosquitoes a night in places where there are lots of the little blood suckers.

These tens of thousands of birds that are dying. This is a very bad thing for us, as humans. Let's just take for example these blackbirds that have died in Arkansas. 5000 red winged blackbirds weigh 625 lbs in a bug-rich environment. Red Winged blackbirds eat mostly insects. So let's just say that red winged blackbirds are responsible for the consumption of 1 ounce of insects per day.... times 5,000 birds divided by 16 ounces give us 312 pounds of bugs, per day, that will not be consumed by these fallen 5000 birds.

312 pounds per day y'all. That's a LOT of bugs. Many of these bugs are herbivores, you know, the ones we keep spraying with POISONS because they get in our lawns, and on our shrubberies and gardens. These poisons kill the bugs, but often times, not before the bird eats the bug!

This time of year, birds are eating a LOT of insects. Hibernating ones they find, dead ones they find. Lots of those dead ones died from poisoning, or were dosed with poisons but not high enough to kill them... until spring maybe, when their metabolisms kick back in.

So here's the double whammy. 5000 Dead birds in winter and early spring adds up to a measly 312 pounds of bugs per day... for the next 90 days or so before these hibernating bugs wake up and start their life cycle!

Whatever killed these birds, has ensured the survival of 312lbs of insects, per day for 90 days. That piles up to a whopping 28,000 pounds of hungry bugs. First half of the double whammy hits our lawns, gardens, shrubberies, orchards.... corn farms....... soybean fields..... and starts eating them. How do we solve this problem, more poison!

the other half of the whammy is that up to half of these 28,000 pounds of bugs are egg layers.... some bugs lay hundreds and thousands of eggs each.... 14,000 pounds more egg laying females will be in the ecosystem because of these birds dying off. That could mean millions of pounds of more bugs to contend with. And that's just the 5,000 blackbirds in Arkansas.... they're dying off all over.... From what I've seen we've lost over 20,000 lbs in the 48 continental states in the last week. That's hypothetically BILLIONS of pounds of more bugs by later summer.

Simple math, complex problem really. It's not that cut and dry, other critters will take up lots of slack. Some of the critters that will pick up the slack for the birds will be INSECTS. Wasps are direct competitors to most everything a black bird eats... so expect lots more wasps... and spiders.... and more POISON to take care of them.

All those factors counted in I think it's impossible to account for everything and even put an accurate number, certainly not at my level of education and data set. But let's take a small number. Let's say that these lost 20,000 pounds of birds only accounts for tens of thousands of bugs that won't get eaten this year, not the hypothetical billions. I predict this to be the worst year ever in the history of the Bugs V. Humans war. It's because some how, we talking apes have managed to kill off a bunch of our allies in this ware. Killed by collateral damage of our Luxurious Lives of Excess!

Our low opinion of birds, bugs and bats. Our wholesale disregard for how really MESSY we are as an animal. We think of animals that crap on the ground as "beasts" but instead of finding a realistic way to handle our own crap, we hide it from ourselves by depositing our urine and feces in good drinking water, and flushing it away wholesale in volumes great enough to solve the worlds bad drinking water problems... and thereby poisoning our own groundwater and rivers.... where we get the drinking water and purify it.... because we're "better" than "beasts".

A composting toilet turns crap and pee into good, viable gardening soil. And when you take into account the cost of the water, they're cheaper than the old kind. But then, who wants to actually have to take a bucket full of crap out to the composter, that's gross. Very realistic and responsible, but oh so very "gross", so that's just out of the question... I'm too good to mess with my crap!

Expect more bugs until we learn to accept responsibility for our own silly behavior. Birds killed by God knows what at this point according to the "news". Bats killed by lazy tourists. A tourist being someone who earns enough money to have LONG vacations and apparently little thought for the impact of their recreational exploits. We're going to have to import European bats to fix the bat problem.

Everyone has heard about bee colonies "collapsing". The latest, upstart notion is that maybe these poisons that "aren't poisonous to bees" at the daily off the flower doses, are getting concentrated into the honey! And pesticide and herbicide use having reached all time highs, is beginning to EXCEED the bee's tolerance dose for these poisons that aren't poisonous to bees. That's just the latest wacky theory though, it hasn't gained the spotlight over just keeping it as an unexplained mystery. Yet.

The birds and the bees are dying off because of our addiction to the notion that we can put poison into the environment and there are no repercussions. Without the birds and the bees...

Well, we all know about the story of the Birds and the Bees... without the birds and the bees doing their thing, there are no babies.

My views on the New World Order Conspiracy

I wouldn't go so far as to say the NWO is completely false. I think the Truth on the NWO shadow government scenario IS there, but it's not a Secret Society. It's just a bunch of Greedy, Egocentric, Messed up Apes with more cash money than God.

Take for example what has happened in Mexico. The drug cartels have become so immensely wealthy, that they own the government and the police, for he most part. Mexico is melting into a 3rd world nation at our back door, and we're worried about their refugees stealing out minimum wage jobs?

So scale that up, on a global scale, and swap the Cartel Lords for Multinational CEO's, World and State Bankers and swap the Various National Governments out for the Mexican Government.

It's not a cohesive, sinister plot formed by a secret cabal of super wealthy fiends. It's just a bunch of wealthy, spiritually void, inhumane bastards out to get all they can and piss on anything Noble, Honest or Just. It's taken 40yrs of the War on Drugs to bring about the disruption of normal society we're seeing in Mexico today.... These Multinationals and Big Banks have been at it for over 100 years, and they've make sure their activities are legal....

It has just gotten out of hand.

The only way for us to resolve the problem is to no longer give them our money. We must become Scrooges with our cash where Big Business is concerned. All of the corruption in the world is based on cash. If the good, working people simply restrict our spending we could control the worlds governments with the economic sword of the people.

For example, If the Consumers declared Economic War on BP and simply quit buying their stuff, how long would they remain an active corporation in America? They would have to sell out and move on. And if the people who bought them didn't make the changes we want with their organization, or clean up their mess... Declare War on them too.

The Healing Power of Prayer

One of the things I have often wondered about was the Healing Power of Prayer.

I've "done some research" on the web and I've read articles where actual scientific studies ere performed and no evidence was found that prayer helped much at all. However, there is no denying that sometimes, when people KNOW other people are praying for them, sometimes miracles happen, and this does have actual statistical proof.

So what does this tell us? That there is no God? Or that God is just very fickle, and if you're lucky he'll roll a 6 when he comes up to your prayer?

My notions on the issue are that the Healing Power of Prayer may just be: when you feel like enough people actually, for real, CARE.... that you SHOULD get better, because there are people out there that NEED you still. This would be a very useful evolutionary adaptation, speeding up the departure of the wicked and preserving the good.

Given the miraculous medical recoveries I have seen, and been. Given the actual numerical facts about how prayer affects recovery no better than no prayer. I know there are no host of angels waiting our commands. It's our natural behavior pattern to forget the failures and be awed by the massive "miracle" of the success when the odds are high enough. Even if we have to believe in Magic to make it seem "plausible". This is a basic survival mechanism built into all creatures with a brain. It's a foundational principle of Natural Selection.

Even the lowest of the lowly low animals, the flatworm knows to GO TO THE LIGHT!!! because when something is swimming over you, it might eat you, best to avoid moving shadows! Because, rather "miraculously" those flatworms that swam to the darkness found a mouth waiting to eat them, and they didn't have many offspring.

In all likely-hood, sometimes people's own healing systems are able to be activated if you secrete just the right balance of hormones and other bio-chemical stuff. Science is already discovering that there are ways to cause this to happen though stem cell research and the Human Genome Project.

There is a way to cause the genetic mechanisms that changed us from children to adults in our prime, run again! That means that when they unlock this Pandora's Box, death will become something very different than how we see it now. The science for this is happening now, in labs around the world. We need more money to more scientists. Not more church buildings or warships.

Or we could keep invoking spirits and appealing to Higher Powers, I suppose.

Crucified...

I have an Anarchist friend on FB. He's a Free Thinking Patriot who posts more than his share of those thought provoking, educational links, and more importantly, he often OPINES in the descriptions. He's been trying to explain to me now No Government would work. I always come back to, well who'll run the Jails? or How will they take care of the Elderly without Medicare... etc.

For the most part, I have led a blameless life. The number of people who could lie down in an fMRI and have their complaints about me proven genuine is a number around 5. But none of these things would carry a fine or jail time if they were adjudicated on in a court of law. I've allowed some bad things to happen that I could have acted differently to have caused a better outlook, and collateral damaged here and there but it wasn't criminal in any way.

But how can this be, as I don't Believe in a Higher power. I just Believe in the Golden Rule. I don't know how else to explain it.

Imagine if we all lived our lives AS IF we there as an All Powerful Being who lived among us, and spoke to us, and could help us. Imagine if he SAW Him Her It (HHI) with our own eyes every day! Imagine if we behaved as if HHI would was going to throw us into a flaming/frozen pit for all eternity if we disobeyed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If we would just live like that, and have our rule be something WACKY like. "Love thy neighbor as thyself" or "Do unto others that which you would not like them to do unto you".

It could be just like Heaven....

man, where have I heard this theory before? I can almost remember, I know I read it somewhere....

Those of us who "get it" live this way already. Laws and Religion are just there for those people who have not stepped up to the next level and Live Right, just Because. I don't need Law or Religion to make me behave. And you know, in Jerusalem, in 33AD..... notions like this would get you Crucified....

Conspiracy Theories

This, like most of my posts here, started out as a FB discussion, turned into an editorial, and wound up here ... :)

Conspiracy theories serve a useful purpose, they draw in those suspicious of their "rulers", yet gullible enough to religiously swallow enough fabrications with the truth, to appear as crackpots, and dismissed in the eyes of the greater Public.

They let out enough truth to satiate those intelligent enough to filter out the BS from the probable, because they get to look down on the "idiots" who fall for the BS. They get to despise those whom they view to be the "evil" ones. They get enough of an ego boost and anger "fix" to keep them effectively neutralized.

They provide the Public with people to suspect and mistrust, when they should suspect and mistrust their "rulers".

They divide the People so that the Few can rule. I'm not a conspiracy buff, though I was raised neck deep in them. However, any clear thinking person knows that when you combine individual wealth surpassing that of most nations with a human being who has no compassion for those who are economically disadvantaged, one has a defacto conspiracy of sorts. These mega wealthy will manipulate government in subtle ways, campaign donations, world conferences, hobnobbery, bribes.... murder.

It's not an "Illuminati" or the "Bilderbergers" but just plain human nature combined with unlimited wealth and greed. Make no mistake, it's happening, and denying it won' t make it go away.

The four "Wars" we are involved in now are a clear example.

There were no WMD, yet we still find ourselves embroiled in an occupation and empire building endeavor in Iraq, for the primary goal of securing an oil field. There are side effects both good and bad that will come from it, hundreds of thousands of casualties, civilian, military and insurgents. A democracy may spring up where there once was dictatorship. Afghanistan is turning out to be about natural resources in my opinion. They've "discovered" massive mineral deposits of gold, gemstones and perhaps most important of all, Lithium, in Afghanistan. We went there looking for Osama Bin Laden, an ex? CIA operative during the Jihad against Russian occupation, almost ten years ago. He should have been found by now if America were really looking for him with earnest.

The War on Terrorism, which claims fewer Americans annually than botched domestic police actions is being carried out simply to maintain a high level of domestic stress. Stressed out people vote, spend and behave more predictably than happy, secure feeling people. If the TSA were to attempt what it's doing now in the 50's, virtually every woman in the line would have slapped the agents patting them down, and every man would punch them in the face.

The War on Drugs and the War on Terror are our modern day witch hunts. Every dark age has one. Potheads pose no danger to society, yet they are subject to unconstitutional search and seizure, wrongful imprisonment, and occasionally summary execution when the "bust" goes bad. The War on Drugs is the longest running war in American History, and it's being waged on Americans at their own expense. Even staying away from drugs is no guarantee of protection, bad cops will frame you if they like your car, or want to get into your safe. SWAT teams sometimes kick down the wrong door and shoot little old ladies in their beds, or 7yr old girls watching TV on the couch, and later find no drugs. Bad police work is more dangerous than terrorism. Annual deaths of Americans, averaged since the first cases in the 70's account for less than 20 deaths per year. Bad police work accounts for 350 deaths annually. (appx numbers of course)

All these things make the very rich richer, keep Democrats and Republicans in office, and keep the Public divided and living in fear.

It's not a "conspiracy". It's just the many, peace loving people being ruled by the few, selfish, immoral bastards. Business as usual for "civilized man".

The only way to change it short of a revolution is for the peace loving people to give up Consumerism, and vote with their dollars as well as in the voting booth. We have to stop voting for plastic junk made in China, with our dollars; and we have to stop voting party line tickets, and vote for individuals on individual merits rather than party affiliations. These two things are the great evils of our age, they have caused all our current political and economic troubles.

In my somewhat humble, nearly redneck, hillbilly opinion. I could be wrong on every count.

Another Danger of a 6,000 year old Earth...

People think I'm crazy because I say there are dangers in believing that God made us by special creation 6,000 years ago; but here is a prime example of how belief in special creation costs OTHER people their lives.

If God created the races separately, then the people in this picture are not my kinfolk. I'm Caucasian, they're black. And she's not even Christian enough to be ashamed of her nakedness!

If we believed these people were family, they would not die this way.

I've often lamented on the dangers of a 6000 year old earth. I am usually referring to how our brain has evolved through the ages. According to neuroscience, we have a reptilian core in our brain. It's just like a crocodile brain almost, it's where get flight or fight, hatred, intense anger, lust and such "basic survival emotions". Basically, behavior one would find in a reptile.

Above and around that area of the brain, we have our mammal structures. The ones which make us care bout our offspring, long for a close bond with a mate, acceptance within our group and for family.

Added to, and on top of that, we have that 10% that we "use", that makes us human.... and I sometimes feel that it spends most of its time rationalizing the actions and thoughts of the other 90%. If we are not careful, the other 90% uses us.

I hadn't really thought about this danger of the 6,000 year old earth though. I'm grateful for the whole line of discussion on Facebook that followed the posting of this photo. These pictures and the discussion have made me realized an even greater danger in "Intelligent Design" musings. I can see nothing intelligent about designing people in such a way as to allow them to let their distant cousins starve to death. While we sit over here corn-fed an lazy.

Without accepting evolution, we can hate someone because they're not the same color, or religion. These poor people cease to be MY cousins, because they are not Christian, or white. With evolution, this woman becomes my KIN and her child my own extended family. These are MY PEOPLE TOO! Dammit.

And that makes it painful to my heart to let them perish. Once they are accepted within that mental wall that surrounds family, my own "heart goes out to them", as describe that biological reaction to harm to kin and self that causes our chest to tighten and our tears to flow.

If your belief system allows you to look at this picture, and not see your family dying for lack of food... question it; because it is murderous. That poor child is a distant niece or nephew of EVERYONE, (it's so emaciated one cannot tell) . And collectively, his uncles and aunts have let him starve because they are too weak minded to make their governments behave properly and cast off antiquated beliefs and demand humanitarian reform from their religions.

Dalai Lama

The compassionate mind is very important. Fear, anger, jealousy are based on a self-centered attitude. By developing a sense of caring for others' well-being your heart automatically opens and that brings transparency, straightforwardness and honesty, which leads to friendship. We are social animals, and one individual's survival relies entirely on the rest of the community.

The Danger of a 6000 year old Earth

I think that our 6000 year old earth is to blame for much of this mess. The world was once Officially Flat, the church eventually had to cede that point as science proved otherwise. Science has unequivocally demonstrated Evolution to be truth and that the Universe is 13.7 billion years old, or so.

The religious minded will have to cede this point just like they had to abandon the Flat Earth, and Earth is the Center of the Universe theories.

Anyone who will take up their Bible and read it, starting at the beginning will find not a book of love and wisdom from a Good God, but a horrid, bloody history of a murderous bronze age tribe of people. It's a book filled with hundreds of cases of genocide and ethnic cleansing. Incest, murder, child-molestation.


God and Jesus both had nothing bad to say about Slavery, something you and I KNOW to be wrong.

The early church was a widely varied thing. Congregations and denominations ranged from the purely aesthetic to the orgiastic, both in the name of Christ.

The Holy Roman Catholic Church rose to power because Rome's military might had waned, and they needed a new way to control the people.

They stole Christianity, warped it's books to meet their ends, and exterminated those who wouldn't go along with them.

So effective were their techniques that few had the bravery to stand against them for over 1500 years. Martin Luther led the first great Evolution of Christianity.

I believe another one is happening now. People are beginning to read their bibles and see them for what they are. Repositories of ancient truths, wisdoms and atrocities, that have been edited for the purpose of controlling the masses.

With a 6000 year old Earth and Biblical understanding of human nature... the Devil makes you lust and do various selfish acts.

With a 13.7 billion year old Universe and a 4.3 billion year old Earth, we are descended of a long chain of animals. Our brain is the result of eons of evolution and posesses structures very similar to the brains of crocodiles, with structures on top of it not terribly dissimilar to those of rodents, birds and "lower" mammals. We have a slice on top that makes us aware, conscious and gives us free will, if we can realize that we only "use 10%" of it.

The trick is, that other 90% isn't just sitting there, it's the Devil. In it lies those base, reptilian desires of lust, hunger, rage and fear. In the mammal structures we have compassion, love, devotion and altruism. And in that 10%, we have reason, logic and morality.

I like to think of it as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Fear and Cowardice

Recently there has been great turmoil in our Nation over the unprecedented invasion of privacy going on in our nation's airports. Honest, law abiding citizens are being treated like criminals. Veterans being treated like drug dealers. Women with prosthetic breasts being forced to remove them, and prove they do not have explosives. Women in traditional garb being asked to violate their religious convictions. Children, screaming "don't touch me" while being touched in places I was told to tell the police if I were touched there when I was small.

And why are we enduring this?

Terrorists.

I ask myself, what is a terrorist? What do they do?

According to the Wikipedia: "Terrorism is the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion.^[1] No universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition of terrorism currently exists.^[2][3] Common definitions of terrorism refer only to those violent acts which are intended to create fear (terror), are perpetrated for a religious, political or ideological goal, deliberately target or disregard the safety of non-combatants (civilians), and are committed by non-government agencies."

By this definition, they have won. America is gripped in an irrational fear.

Many people are offended when I call this an irrational fear. Fear of nonpoisonous spiders, is irrational. Fear of non poisonous snakes is irrational. Fear of bridges, is, while a very unlikely way to die, does claim a life now and then. Every year, on average, 57 people are killed by lightening, yet our nation is not gripped in fear every time thunder claps. While some may suffer exaggerated levels of fear, most of us calmly seek an indoor location and proceed at a calm pace.

Worrying about whether or not the person next to you have a bomb in his underwear is a highly exaggerated fear. So far, no one has died this way. One man has suffered severe genital burns trying to set off an improvised munition, but no deaths. Ironically, he had no balls in the first place. A real man doesn't kill innocent people to make his statement. If he has a qualm with another man, he walks up to him, calls him out and they settle affairs like men. Cowards use terrorism. Cowards fear terrorism.

It was with considerable difficulty I managed to find a most disturbing mortality statistic. Innocent civilians killed by police officers due to mistaken identity, or negligence. I have only been able to find the number for this for the calendar year 1993. Apparently, no agency is tasked with compiling this statistic; or they simply do not publish them.

In 1993, 330 innocent, law abiding citizens were wrongfully slain by policemen. In that same year, 30 innocent, law abiding citizens were wrongfully slain by fellow, otherwise law abiding private gun owners. In 1993, there were four incidents of international terrorism that claimed 9 American lives. 9 per year is the statistical average over the last fifty years since the USA began meddling in middle-eastern political affairs via the CIA and the multinational oil corporations.

There were 770,000 policemen in 1993 and 80 million registered gun owners. If you do the math, that means you're 1200 times more likely to slain wrongfully by a cop than a lawful gun owner. Cops kill 11x more innocent Americans every year than civilians.

Cops kill 36.6 times as many Americans as Muslim terrorists.

Yet how many of us have irrational fear of policemen? How many of us think it would be preposterous to disarm our police forces; when in fact, we might be safer with individual citizens being armed than our policemen.

So I must ask you, should we really be invading the privacy rights of veterans, cancer survivors, children and law abiding Americans; because Muslim terrorists kill 9 people a year while our own police kill 330?

We must not let the terrorists win. Their goal is to force us to live in fear, until we give into their demands. We must address the real problems. Why are they here, what do they want?

They live in countries where religious fanatics run the government. They've only read one book, or books written about that one book. They can kill their wives if her ankle is seen by another man in public. A father can kill his daughter if she "dishonors" the family, and I cannot think of anything more dishonorable than that.

Poor, ignorant people grow up to be terrorists.

For what we've spent on full body scanners, and a decade of the war machine we could have changed those people's lives for the better. Just a couple of solar panels and some LED lights, a 24 volt well pump, and a way to move their sewage away from their houses and dispose of it in a sanitary way. The ability to grow their own food.

Instead, we are molesting them. Economic molestation. We're taking the oil from beneath their ancestral lands, giving their radical religious wingnut leaders a pittance of the money, and the rest of the profits are raked in by the CEO's and stockholders of the Oil companies.

So we can drive SUV's and musclecars that get less than 15mpg in some cases.

You'd be angry and hateful too, living in your dirt floored hut, scrabbling out a living in lands where your ancestors used to be able to survive, until the climate started to change because of pollution... oh wait, most Americans don't believe in Climate Change... but we do believe in 15mpg muscle cars, so we can feel sexy.

I'm not condoning terrorism, but just think about it.

What would Jesus do? Would he rip up and down the road in his hot car trying to impress young girls, or would he want us to make this right? And I have a funny feeling, if a TSA agent tried to check His scrotum for explosives, they might have to detain Him.

We are at a crossroads in history, and this BS that we as a People are having to endure over terrorism should not be driving us to be fearful cowards supporting the Backscatte Scanner industry and Big Oil industries.

Once upon a time we were the world's greatest economic power. We could have brought that power to bear on these nations, and helped them solve their poverty, and change their policy of religious ignorance. Now, thanks to our extreme level of corporate welfare and irresponsibility and warmongering political parties, we are very nearly reduced to a 3rd world nation and we are looking to China to bail us out.

And we're afraid of brown guys who may have explosives shoved up their wazoo, or wrapped around their testicles.

How rational is that?

Don't touch my junk....

I'm genuinely ashamed of my Nation at times. While we still remain, from my biased point of view, the "best place to live" on earth, I no longer recognize the country I live in. It has changed from the "home of the free and the land of the brave" into "the home of the FEE and the land of the SLAVE".

Recently a genuine American Patriot stood up to being groped by airport security, and I have listened to news, and social network posts from people saying "Get used to it." "Ride a bus if you don't like it." "It's to make the airplanes safe" What will these people say when some terrorist decides to shove some plastic explosives up his wazoo? Anal probes for all? If some TSA person feels me up a little too much, I'll do my best to break his jaw. I was molested as a child, and I'll not stand for it again. When someone touches you down there, against your will, it's molestation.

They already lock the cockpit doors, and there have only been TWO incidences of people trying to blow up planes from the passenger compartment. We have one man who tried to use a shoe bomb, and another that burned is "junk" off with a groin bomb. Neither were successful, and were interfered with in one case by a CITIZEN. Not a policeman, not a law.. just an average Joe. A brave man, a Patriot, surrounded by cowards

Why in the hell are Free Americans being groped in order to fly?

On 9-11 we lost less than 4,000 people, 9 years ago.... We've since lost more than that in soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. We've taken 100's of thousands of lives Iraq and Afghanistan and Pakistan in retribution, most of them innocent, family people who's worst crime has been inheriting their parent's religion.

4,000 people in 9 years... let's put that into perspective with other causes of death in the USA.

Every year in America, appx 7,000 people die from complications with non steroidal pain relievers.... 9x7,000 is 56,000 people that have been killed by over the counter pain relievers....

Where is our War on Aspirn?

Each year 20,000 Americans are hurried on to their untimely ends by being too kinky for their own good.... listed as "sexual behaviors" on JAMA's statistics...That's 20Kx9yrs, that's 180,000 Americans who've fallen prey to being kinky...

Where's our War on Perverts? Why aren't they busting down people's doors saving them from their own depravity... they don't hesitate if you have some marijuana...

Adverse reactions to prescription drugs, that's the ones that our government approves of.... cause 32,000 deaths annually... 32Kx9yrs=288,000 Americans who've fallen prey to the greed of the Pharmaceutical Industry...

Where is our War on Big Pharmacy? Do we hold the FDA accountable, the pharmaceutical companies?

Alcohol claims 85,000 Americans annually... 85Kx9yrs=765,000 in the nine years since 9/11.

Where is our War on Alcohol... oh wait, we tried that, it failed miserably, caused rampant crime and increases in alcohol abuse... just like our War on Drugs is now... hmmmm guess Washington didn't learn it's lesson then either.

Obesity claims 365,000 Americans annually... 365,000x9- 3.2 million since 911.... and before they die, they live compromised lives often filled with anxiety, depression and handicap...

Where is our War on Fat?

Tobacco tops the list claiming 485,000 Americans EVERY year... 485,000x9= 4.35 million Americans suffered lingering deaths not terribly unlike the obese casualties, often with horrid lung complications, heart disease and the anxiety and stress that goes with it.....

Where is our War on Tobacco.....

It all just goes to prove that our various "wars" are nothing more than political gambits to gain political influence and to protect the profits of special interests.... safety of Americans is not on their agenda.

So why are we all being full body scanned or groped by federal employees? Will you stand idly by while your daughter or son is felt up by some potential pervert? Personally, I couldn't give a damn. I'm single and it'd be the most action I've seen in months... If it was a guy I might pop him one upside the head, or if it were a woman, I'd ask for her phone number and offer to take her out for dinner.... the reason we're having to be subjected to these unwarranted measures is plain and simple... Money. Thousands of multimillion dollar whole body scanners are being deployed, and we don't even know how safe they are. Stock prices for the companies that make them are through the roof..... and who has the money to invest in those things now.... the people who have private planes, who don't get x-rayed or groped....

On the Damned Human Race by Mark Twain

I have been studying the traits and dispositions of the lower animals (so-called), and contrasting them with the traits and dispositions of man. I find the result humiliating to me. For it obliges me to renounce my allegiance to the Darwinian theory of the Ascent of Man from the Lower Animals; since it now seems plain to me that the theory ought to be vacated in favor of a new and truer one, this new and truer one to be named the Descent of Man from the Higher Animals.

In proceeding toward this unpleasant conclusion I have not guessed or speculated or conjectured, but have used what is commonly called the scientific method. That is to say, I have subjected every postulate that presented itself to the crucial test of actual experiment, and have adopted it or rejected it according to the result...

Some of my experiments were quite curious. In the course of my reading I had come across a case where, many years ago, some hunters on our Great Plains organized a buffalo hunt for the entertainment of an English earl. They had charming sport. They killed seventy-two of those great animals; and ate part of one of them and left the seventy-one to rot. In order to determine the difference between an anaconda and an earl (if any) I caused seven young calves to be turned into the anaconda's cage. The grateful reptile immediately crushed one of them and swallowed it, then lay back satisfied. It showed no further interest in the calves, and no disposition to harm them. I tried this experiment with other anacondas; always with the same result. The fact stood proven that the difference between an earl and an anaconda is that the earl is cruel and the anaconda isn't; and that the earl wantonly destroys what he has no use for, but the anaconda doesn't. This seemed to suggest that the anaconda was not descended from the earl. It also seemed to suggest that the earl was descended from the anaconda, and had lost a good deal in the transition.

I was aware that many men who have accumulated more millions of money than they can ever use have shown a rabid hunger for more, and have not scrupled to cheat the ignorant and the helpless out of their poor servings in order to partially appease that appetite. I furnished a hundred different kinds of wild and tame animals the opportunity to accumulate vast stores of food, but none of them would do it. The squirrels and bees and certain birds made accumulations, but stopped when they had gathered a winter's supply, and could not be persuaded to add to it either honestly or by chicane. In order to bolster up a tottering reputation the ant pretended to store up supplies, but I was not deceived. I know the ant. These experiments convinced me that there is this difference between man and the higher animals: he is avaricious and miserly; they are not.

In the course of my experiments I convinced myself that among the animals man is the only one that harbors insults and injuries, broods over them, waits till a chance offers, then takes revenge. The passion of revenge is unknown to the higher animals...

Indecency, vulgarity, obscenity (these are strictly confined to man); he invented them. Among the higher animals there is no trace of them. They hide nothing; they are not ashamed. Man, with his soiled mind, covers himself. He will not even enter a drawing room with his breast and back naked, so alive are he and his mates to indecent suggestion. Man is The Animal that Laughs. But so does the monkey, as Mr. Darwin pointed out; and so does the Australian bird that is called the laughing jackass. No! Man is the Animal that Blushes. He is the only one that does it or has occasion to...

Man is the only Patriot. He sets himself apart in his own country, under his own flag, and sneers at the other nations, and keeps multitudinous uniformed assassins on hand at heavy expense to grab slices of other people's countries, and keep them from grabbing slices of his. And in the intervals between campaigns, he washes the blood off his hands and works for the universal brotherhood of man, with his mouth.

Man is the Religious Animal. He is the only Religious Animal. He is the only animal that has the True Religion, several of them. He is the only animal that loves his neighbor as himself, and cuts his throat if his theology isn't straight. He has made a graveyard of the globe in trying his honest best to smooth his brother's path to happiness and heaven. He was at it in the time of the Caesars, he was at it in Mahomet's time, he was at it in the time of the Inquisition, he was at it in France a couple of centuries, he was at it in England in Mary's day... The higher animals have no religion. And we are told that they are going to be left out, in the Hereafter. I wonder why? It seems questionable taste.

Man is the Reasoning Animal. Such is the claim. I think it is open to dispute. Indeed, my experiments have proven to me that he is the Unreasoning Animal. Note his history, as sketched above. It seems plain to me that whatever he is he is not a reasoning animal. His record is the fantastic record of a maniac. I consider that the strongest count against his intelligence is the fact that with that record back of him he blandly sets himself up as the head animal of the lot: whereas by his own standards he is the bottom one.

In truth, man is incurably foolish. Simple things which the other animals easily learn, he is incapable of learning. Among my experiments was this. In an hour I taught a cat and a dog to be friends. I put them in a cage. In another hour I taught them to be friends with a rabbit. In the course of two days I was able to add a fox, a goose, a squirrel and some doves. Finally, a monkey. They lived together in peace; even affectionately.

Next, in another cage I confined an Irish Catholic from Tipperary, and as soon as he seemed tame I added a Scotch Presbyterian from Aberdeen. Next a Turk from Constantinople; a Greek Christian from Crete; an Armenian; a Methodist from the wilds of Arkansas; a Buddhist from China; a Brahman from Benares. Finally, a Salvation Army Colonel from Wapping. Then I stayed away two whole days. When I came back to note results, the cage of Higher Animals was all right, but in the other there was but a chaos of gory odds and ends of turbans and fezzes and plaids and bones and flesh, not a specimen left alive. These Reasoning Animals had disagreed on a theological detail and carried the matter to a Higher Court.

One is obliged to concede that in true loftiness of character, Man cannot claim to approach even the meanest of the Higher Animals. It is plain that he is constitutionally incapable of approaching that altitude; that he is constitutionally afflicted with a Defect which must make such approach forever impossible, for it is manifest that this defect is permanent in him, indestructible, ineradicable...

And so I find that we have descended and degenerated, from some far ancestor (some microscopic atom wandering at its pleasure between the mighty horizons of a drop of water perchance) insect by insect, animal by animal, reptile by reptile, down the long highway of smirch less innocence, till we have reached the bottom stage of development (namable as the Human Being). Below us, nothing.

Why people are all up in your business....

I really, really, REALLY wish someone had told me this stuff when I was 10...

Recent discoveries in the science of primatology have brought to question the age-old truth that the reason humans have such big brains was the discovery of language and tool use. They are speculating that our ancestral primate obsession with social status gave rise to the growth of the brain. But studies are showing that the bigger the brain, the more obsessed social rank the animal becomes. Whole regions of their brains are devoted to analyzing subtle movements, gestures and expressions, tones of voice, body language, pheromone detection and most importantly, all for the purpose of social rank recognition.

In stable primate groups, that is, where the alpha is established, is calm and assertive, and there is no "drama" happening over the alpha position, every monkey or ape in the troupe knows his or her rank. They literally take turns at the best food places in this order in some species!There are daily micro-struggles over this flea-picking order. And yes, how long who picks fleas off of whom, is in the equation!!!

We're no different, we just think we're special, and better than the other animals... so, this whole HUGE portion of our "unconscious" mind it agonizing, without stop over petty social dramas. If we don't get enough of it, we'll make some trouble, just to see how it settles out...

The trick to being a good human i think, is learning to know what's "wrong with us". Realizing that an unconscious monkey-brain lies down there below that rational, human slice on top. It's has an agenda, knowing where we stand in the pecking order. It's this part that wakes you up angry over who said what yesterday, at 3AM. It keeps you awake on FB all night just in case that special someone logs on... It's this part that is mean to the nerd, participates in gossip, bullies others, steals, cheats

And below that we have structures that are called "the reptilian core". Which in turn is driving the monkey and human brain with motives of it's own. Reproduction. Food. Warmth. Protection. It's this part that causes teen pregnancy, drunk driving spousal abuse....

Smoke too many cigarettes and you'll find out just how that part of your mind really is control! Or try to quit a Pepsi, or coffee habit. Shoot some heroine, or smoke some crack... you will find out what happens then you get your reptilian core hooked on a chemical it cannot produce. It makes you into a very ugly animal indeed.

FNORDS

I was about to head out the door on my way to Nashville. HOLY SHIT I'm doing something spontaneous.... Anyway, I'm not normal, I admit it, I took a lawn dart to the brain at 5, so I have some brain damage I think...

I love to discuss politics. Religion. Philosophy. I routinely cause eye sprain amongst my FB friends with all my brain damaged rants. (eyes rolling) It's just me. I ain't right. I have several friends, some personal, some former teachers from my first life, as I think of it. Some I've just met along the way for no other reason that his mom had a hot FB picture, and then I got so see some of his mental ramblings... It's a chain of friend finding that was once impossible.

It makes for a very fast exchange of mental DNA if you will, a new evolutionary step in free thinking. We are on the verge of a new 21st Century Enlightenment I belive.

Back to my post. Fnords. I read an article today about how our brains grow new brain cells. In school I was taught that you had as many brain cells as you were born with, and from there on they died off. If you drank alcohol or smoked pot, or took drugs, even pain pills, you were killing them off faster than they would if you took care of them. Biblically, I was taught that my body was the temple of my mind, and if I wanted to have my mind when I was old I damn well better take care of it.

As a result, I rarely drank as a teen. After drinking some Purple Jesus, I once betrayed an entire group of my friends because I couldn't handle the collective pressure of being pasted AND lying.

I smoked weed once when I was 19, and just because it was in the balance of whether or not I was going to get laid.

I smoked it again once at a medieval combat war in Arizona. I had a motorcycle wreck at 9, and have no ankle in my left foot, you wouldn't know it if you saw me on the street. I refuse to be handicapped. However, my left ankle is fused at a fixed angle, and it's designed for walking on solid ground. At the beach I walk like a zombie.

This War, Estrella War 98, or something, (help me out SCA ppl). Arizona, 90 pounds of armor on me, was kinda hot. I was wielding a 9' spear and had two sword and shield men in front of me. The California team was outnumbered 3 to one as I remember.

We had 1200 men and women on the field that day. When the armies moved, the ground rumbled. I'm not kidding, it was intimidating if you have a vivid imagination, and could literally throw yourself back in time, and imagine the stakes were lethal and the loser would be decimated, raped and occupied. (I've been reading the Old Testament lately, that was commonplace in the first 5 books)

It was all sand. Me and my zombie foot. The lines met and we held for about 5 seconds before it descended into chaos. My unit of 3 found it'self faced with two spear men and two sword and shields. My confidence level was about 2 on a one to 10. And then suddenly, my brain ceased producing words. It fell silent.

I don't have great combat skills. I was a mediocre, but fun to be around heavy (armored fighter) and by then I had learned how to drink my ass off....

( shudder. there was this one time, at an SCA Event, and there was this Jalapeno liqueur and these people with a funny cigarette)

My 2nd joint my whole life and I was pre-drunk off my ass when they smoked me out. I left the van because they started getting a little more romantic in front of me than I was comfortable with. I remember, right before bed talking to someone, seated on one side of a picnic table. I closed my eyes, just a blink is seemed, and then there was an oak tree when I opened my eyes. I'd fallen off the picknic table, onto the ground, looking up into the tree canopy. "Whoa!" I thought, or said. I realized it was time to go to bed. And I woke up feeling great. My back didn't hurt, my foot wasn't bothering me, no hangover! What the hell!

Didn't dawn on me then that it was the weed.

Back to Arizona. I turned into some kind of rattan-fu maniac. I popped the spear man on the right with a thrust he wasn't expecting. He was expecting a timid poke to cause an opening. I had already seen the opening. I stepped full broadside between my two men. My side touched against their shields. My spear was about 4 feet longer due to the daring lunge. I flung my full faith on my shields, and they kept me unscathed.

The odds were even now. The whole thing is like a blur, and it would take a chapter just to draw it all out I wound up backed into a tree with only a sword and shield guy and one spear man. The others fell one by one, it was a dramatic experience. Kind of like my own little mini 300. I'll never forget thinking, whew, I'm still alive, when they blew the whistle because our flag went down.

And then I felt the pain. It hit like a sledge hammer dropped on the top of my left foot. I had just fought for my life, for 4 or 5 minutes, in SAND. My nemesis!

It took me half an hour to hobble back to camp, a trip that had taken only 5 minutes to walk to. In the end my comrades wound up hauling my spear an helm, and one stalwart chap hefted my arm over his shoulders and we hobbled into camp like something out of a Monte Python set after the shot. I proceeded to drink my pain away, but it wasn't working, and someone said to me, pssst, hey buddy you wanna try some pot, it's great for pain....

And it almost went away. But, I was able to ignore it and have a great time! I didn't get to participate in day two of the fighting, I could barely walk. That's when I had my vivid and hair raising imagination about Bible Days, and how it must have looked when the 12 tribes were descending upon yet another town God "gave" to them. How mighty God seemed to me that day. And at that time in my life, I was so embroiled in shit at home, I failed to appreciate it, or see the fnord in my Bible.

So what is a fnord? There were a series of freaky books written called the Illuminatus Trilogy And a kinda science fiction revolutionary pamphlet called Principia Discordia. It was Anarchy stuff, I didn't see the relevance of a lot of it at the time, but I didn't really understand metaphor yet either. In these books, there's a government conspiracy where children are brainwashed to not see the word "fnord" but rather than see it, they would suddenly be overcome with a sense of fear and anxiety. They would put the Fnords into newspapers, magazines and books but not in advertisements (or TV shows). Of course "fnord" wasn't the actual word, if I were typing the actual word, you'd leave this page feeling afraid and anxious, unless you were the Elite. They saw the fnords and weren't affected by them.

In the article about new nerve cell growth they said that in fact we have stem cells in our brains, and we grow new neurons all the time. Which means I could have been smoking pot all those years and having fun dammit!I only refrained because I didn't want to loose my brain cells!

mostly kidding.

I don't like to go to work high, or drive high, or be "stoned". Marijuana is the best medicine for my chronic (pun intended) pain that I have due to my fused ankle. Most modern pain pills are not only expensive, but they make you groggy, if you take enough to end the pain.

could easily get a prescription for anything I wanted. Lucky me, I'm allergic to opiates. Codine makes be break out in hives! I work. I can't be affected that way, and work, or drive. It's not safe to drive on pain pills, or work around dangerous equipment while taking pills. Just as dangerous as going to work high on weed, or alcohol.

However, to get an effective pain remediation with marijuana, one does not need to smoke enough to get high. In fact, getting high on pot really only lasts from 1 to 4 hours, depending on your tolerance levels and the potency of what you get. Since all the weed I've seen in the last 10 years comes in via Mexican suppliers, you never know what you're going to get for your ounce of weed. It's usually half stems and seeds, and the rest is poorly cured, moldy marijuana. You get ripped off 50% by volume usually, you can't smoke stems and seeds. However, the pain relieving effects last for several days, with a slow tapering off of effects. It takes me about 2 weeks before I have to start using ice packs and ibuprofen in the evenings. I won't work on pain meds, and I take as few asprin type junk as possible, because I want it to work when I take it, and I don't want my liver gone when I'm 50. I have been smoking weed since I met my current X wife. And most of it was relatively free of physical pain, don't get me started on the emotional pain, she's psycho.

I quit 3 weeks ago. I have begun a custody battle for my children and I need to test clean when the shit hits the fan. My children mean far more to me than my marijuana. I can deal with the pain to get them back. I may have to move to a medical marijuana state though. I don't want to work and HOLY JESUS my oldness is setting in on me. I have been stove up for two weeks. I feel 60. (coming from a 44 yr old that means something!)

Cleaning up today I found this tiny nugget of weed. I mean tiny. 3 weeks ago I would have scoffed. It would have had no effect as my tolerance was so high. I broke down and smoked some. Not even half of it. And my back feels fine. Is it psychosomatic, I don't know. I'll find out in a few days. And I'm going to pay particular attention to it, I'm curious to see how long it will be before I break down and take two more puffs. It's a science experiment.

I'm not worried about getting in trouble, even by Tennessee's Draconian Nazi Pot Laws, it wouldn't get me jail time it's so little.

So I sat down to check my FB and a friend of mine had commented on the Neurgenesis article. The article says that 3 things were shown to help grow brain cells. 1. Exercise, 2. Calorie Restriction, and 3. a chemical found in Turmeric.

My friend had replied, "I need to get some of that Curcumin", the chemical in turmeric.

I had had the same exact thought, but when I read it posted there, I realized that I had "fnorded" the exercise and the calorie-restriction parts. As if they weren't even an option. I wondered for a moment why that was....

I like junk food and I'm lazy!

My reading list has recently had a book on it called Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, by Carl Sagan and Ann Druyen. It's basically the Science version of the first 5 books of the Bible. I highly recommend it, they have an enchanting writing style. It's simple to understand, and you'll feel better about yourself, your life, and the world when you get done.

My lower mind wants no part o the exercise, or cutting down on food.

With most things these days, my thoughts turned back to the Old Testament. And all those cities the Hebrews killed man woman and child (except the virgin girls, they were fond of them for some reason, they "let" them live)

How is it that we read the bible and then think, "God is Good". I mean, he commanded horrid atrocities....

My mind was on fnords and ancient human ancestors, pain, the Bible and neurogenesis. ( I don't have a girlfriend, ok) And I realized what purpose those horrid attrocities served in Judaism. They were the Fnords. We read over them, but shake them off in a fearful, anxious way thinking Oh, God's all grown up now, he doesn't do that anymore.... or will he if I don't behave?

They were the fnords of the Old Testament. Only they weren't hidden, ignored words, they were whole chapters of atrocities. But we ignore them, and fnord them out, just like exercise and calorie restriction.

Marijuana Prohibition is a fnord. Someone could tell on you! You could get caught driving home with it from your guy who knows a guy who knows a guy who knows a mexican... since we can't grow our own, or we'll go to jail and lose everything... another Fnord. And it's not just a fnord for the smokers, the cops could bust down your door. They make mistakes. Every year innocent Americans are shot in their homes by botched drug busts. And if that isn't Fnord enough for you, there's crime in the streets and Columbian cartels too and Taliban, and they can't keep the pedophiles in jail for all the potheads, so watch your children, FNORDS!!!

Have a nice day. I'm headed off to Nashville. To go to 12th and porter lounge, wherever in the hell that is!

Back from the show and I had a blast. I even got to play camera man for my main act, Greta Gaines (total hottie! but married of course) . Met some fun people an listened to some awesome music.... good times.

they're all around us!

heart broken by someone who doesn't seem to give a shit?
got a kid that lives off you, as if they deserve to be kept up?
got a friend that is an eternal, unemployable mooch?

You just may know an undiagnosed Narcissist.

I urge everyone to watch these videos. Chances are you know someone who is an undiagnosed Narcissist. They think they're the shit, they don't seek diagnosis. They don't know they have the disorder, they think it's normal and everyone else is meat who isn't like them.


Recent events in my life have led me to look into Narcissistic Personality Disorder. I feel a need to share this information, as I feel that the vast majority of us are suffering on this planet because there is a sizable chunk of our population that are undiagnosed Narcissists.

I really only started looking into this stuff because I have concerns about my kids. But I suddenly think we all might need to watch this.

Surely there are may of you who have long term emotional scars from brushes with this type of person, or it may even be possible that you may have it! I am seriously going have myself checked. It runs too deep in my family and I see it all around me.

Here is what I mean. You are stuck in traffic. It's 4 lanes deep. At a point a head of you, the 4th lane vanishes. There is a sign which says "Merge Left" in symbol.

A normal person will thoughtfully merge with the traffic to the left.

A psychopathic narcissist will race ahead and cut in at the last possible moment, and hurl insults at anyone who tries to impede them.

I may be a form of narcissist that I have yet to hear about. Chad help me out here! I will sit in that right lane, right down to the bitter end... and only just exceed the speed of the cars to my left. I don't give a rats ass what the people behind me think.

They are the reason that all those thousands to the left are stuck going bumper to bumper for 45 minutes over 4 miles. Try my tactic sometime. You will notice that the traffic jam will have dramatically improved by the time you merge.

And when you do merge, you have no problem whatsoever, the people on the left let you in happily.

Don't let the narcissists bully you any more. Claim the outside lane for the sane people, we deserve to get home just as soon as those psychos on the right.


here's the first link I found that set me off: boring but effective

Narcissistic Personality Disorder pt 1

here are the professionally produced feature links:

Sam Vaknin Analyzes Barack Obama (part 1) on youtbe
I, Psychopath - Sam Vaknin


Frankly, after watching these shows, I am shocked.

My mom has it. Undiagnosed, but in my opinion it would explain a lot.
My Father had most of the criteria.
My Ex Wife seems to have it.

I fear that the only two things standing between me and having this full on were two childhood accidents. The first involved a lawn dart which struck me right between the hemispheres of my brain, where ones Self Awareness, Philosophy and Religion sit. Amazingly, I have always had difficulty reading and writing in first person. One summer when I was 15, I wanted to learn how to touch type. I put a finger chart on my bedroom wall, and I wrote a novel, in first person, and it was so incredibly difficult for me to do it. I can't describe my difficulty with writing fiction in first person. Metaphorically, it's akin to typing with work gloves on.

I was involved in a motorcycle accident at the age of nine. It left me without an ankle and cut my adult height from a physician estimated 6'5" to 6'7" to 5"9". It did leave me with a malpractice annuity that seems to have served as a Narcissist Magnet my entire life.

However, absent these two events in specific, I can't help but wonder if I too may have been a full blown Narcissist. Heck, I may be, I haven't finished researching this. I may have a form of it I have yet to hear about.

I urge everyone to watch these videos. Chances are you know someone who is an undiagnosed Narcissist. They think they're the shit, they don't seek diagnosis. They don't know they have the disorder, they think it's normal and everyone else is meat who isn't like them.