Month: April 2012

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Theophillis Goodyear: The Tragedy of OWS – Failure to Act on Electoral Reform

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Theophillis Goodyear

If the OWS movement had only gotten behind the Electoral Reform Act of 2102, it could have worked to their advantage in a way they may not have considered. If they could have gotten Washington to take action and get behind the act, it would have been a foot in the door for the OWS movement that would have enhanced their prestige and increased their power. In other words, once the act was in the works it would have allowed the OWS movement to coast a little without looking like it was running out of steam. Because how can a movement be running out of steam when Washington insiders are working to meet the demands of the movement? And if OWS had succeeded in getting Washington to pass the act, if would have turned the OWS movement into a force to be reckoned with. A lot of it would be based on illusions of perception. But illusions of perception can be very powerful.

The failure of the OWS movement would be laughable if it wasn't so sad. While they were wasting time having encounter groups and “playing house”—-creating makeshift libraries and giving “teach ins” about consensus building techniques, etc.—-time was passing them by. Opportunity got tired of knocking on their door and walked away to find some other door to knock on. There's nothing wrong with teaching consensus building techniques. But there's a time and a place for everything. And the learning curve was so slow that the OWS movement wasn't able to stay ahead of unfolding events and capitalize on their momentum. It was a breakdown of efficiency; it's as simple as that. Indecision, inaction, lack of clear objectives, lack of resolve, all led to squandering the moment. If the OWS movement still hasn't learned this lesson, they're living in fantasyland.

The Electoral Reform Act of 2102 had a real chance of working. Why? Because virtually every voter would like to see electoral reform and because the act is based on common sense. And because it was based on common sense, politicians would've had a very hard time fighting it once it became part of mainstream awareness. Being against electoral reform would be like being against God, mother, country, and apple pie. What politician could have resisted it without looking like an ass?

In the end, I'm not sure the OWS movement proved anything except that trying to get anarchists to agree on anything is like trying to herd cats. OWS had politicians right where they wanted them, and they decided to take a nap. And when they woke up the politicians were gone. They knew the heat was off and they got back to business as usual. Or maybe the OWS movement is still napping. It's hard to tell. Anyway, the politicians have moved on.

Is it too late to make an issue of the Electoral Reform Act of 2012? I don't know. I don't think anyone can say. But if the OWS movement ever regains momentum, I wish they would consider making it one of their demands. It may work to their advantage in ways they can't predict. It may get the public back on their side, and it may serve notice to the politicians that the OWS movement still has a few tricks up their collective sleeve and aren't quite ready to be tossed on the trash heap of history. Here's hoping.

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Marcus Aurelius: Living in an Upside Down Land – Email from O-6 USMC

Cultural Intelligence
Marcus Aurelius

Following is circulating among military circles via email.

From:  REDACTED [USMC O-6 Retired]<

We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress & the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution, But overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.”

Abraham Lincoln

“… there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither, Safe, nor Politically Correct, nor Popular, but one must take it, because its RIGHT!!”

Common Sense

Upside-down Land

You know you live in anUpside-down Land if…

Continue reading “Marcus Aurelius: Living in an Upside Down Land – Email from O-6 USMC”

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Sepp Hasslberger: Putting Ground Transport Deep Underground

05 Energy, Communities of Practice, Earth Intelligence
Sepp Hasslberger

Evacuated tube travel to replace trains, planes and automobiles?

“Some people spend their life watching the tube, but Daryl Oster is spending his trying to get people to travel in one.”

“To be fair, Evacuated Tube Travel might be even bigger — Oster is proposing uisng magnetic levitation to send car-sized capsules through giant long vacuum tubes at speeds of up to 4,000 miles per hour.”

“The passenger vehicle is pressurized and has plenty of air, but moves through the airless tube on a magnetic track and all movement is controlled by manipulating the magnetic forces that are at play between the track and the capsule, according to Discovery.”

“Oster and his team are selling licenses for the rights to build the tracks and tubes, but says the ultimate network will need both private and public funding. He also plans to start a Kickstarter campaign in hopes of raising funds for a documentary about ETT.”

Phi Beta Iota:  We are long overdue for putting ground transport as well as utilities deep underground but this will require greater intelligence with integrity about structural resilience and human early warning in the face of earthquake potential.  This could also spawn greater attention to underground small cities, with the surface areas gradually redirected to recovering agricultural land and localized renewable energy platforms.

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IVN Steele on Electoral Reform Part 10: Legislation

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Robert David STEELE Vivas
Robert David STEELE Vivas

Steele on Electoral Reform – Part 10: Legislation

All proposed legislation without exception be published on line, normally one month prior to vote but no less than 24-72 hours for emergencies, to include explicit geospatial pointers for all “earmarks” each of which must be publicly announced.

– – – – – – –

“Put enough eyeballs on it, no bug is invisible.” America — as with other countries, but most in contradiction with our Founding Fathers’ intent — has been “ruled by secrecy,” not only from the financial world, where banks counterfeit credit they do not have to earn interest they do not merit, but also in Congress, where secrecy, obscure language, and blatant corruption have combined to make every law a corrupt law, generally containing earmarks that are not in the public interest, but result in the sponsor of that earmark receiving a 5% bribe (the standard “fee” on Capitol Hill for delivering an earmark).

What this really means is that the public treasury is being discounted 95%, and given away for so many things across the military, energy, health, and agricultural sectors, to name just four, that the public is a loser twice: first in having corrupt Members who divert five percent of the public treasury to their own “need” for huge war chests to fund their campaigns, and second in having corrupt Members who sponsor one another’s earmarks despite the fact that at least half the money is known in advance to be fraud, waste, and abuse–this is true, for example, of the Pentagon budget, where 1% of that budget pays for the 4% of the force that takes 80% of the casualties — the other 99% of the Pentagon budget goes to contractors, and I feel very confident in suggesting that half of that 99% or 44.5%, is fraud, waste, and abuse.

By mandating publish posting of all legislation in advance, we make it possible for alert citizens to enforce integrity on their individual Members.

Learn More

Previous: Part 9: Funding

Next: Part 11: Constitutional Amendment

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Event: 13-15 July 2012 NYC Hackers on Planet Earth (HOPE) Number Nine

Cultural Intelligence, Hacking

HOPE Ticket Sales to Benefit Electronic Frontier Foundation: For the entire month of April, we will be donating ten percent of the amount brought in from HOPE ticket sales to the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Purchase your tickets now!

Call for Activities issued: workshops, artwork, collaborative spaces.  Bring your creativity!

HOPE Number 9 Call for Hackerspaces seeks participation

Confirmed talks (so far) are now listed.  Some speakers are returning favorites, and others are fresh new faces.  All talks will offer something new and exciting.

Keynote announced!  The Yes Men will talk about their approach to hacking corporations and saving the world.  See the press release at 2600.com.

About HOPE

Continue reading “Event: 13-15 July 2012 NYC Hackers on Planet Earth (HOPE) Number Nine”

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Abolala Soudavar: Alternative Jewish Perspective on Iran

05 Iran, 08 Wild Cards, Cultural Intelligence, IO Deeds of War, IO Impotency

Israel’s Escalating Rhetoric on Iran

By following Israel in lawlessness, the US is sullying its own constitution

by Abolala Soudavar

Veterans Today, 3 April 2012

In September of 2010, a group of the Friends of the Freer and Sackler Museums of Washington DC were visiting Iran. As a former member of the board of these museums, I naturally extended an invitation for the group to visit the Malek Public Library and Museum in Tehran, an institution that was endowed by my grandfather to the Shrine of the Eighth Imam. To coincide with this visit, the Malek Library had organized a small exhibition of religious texts—Islamic, Christian, Zoroastrian and Jewish—at the center of which stood a magnificent 18th century Torah scroll. The scroll had been recently donated to the Malek Library by the Chief Rabi of one of Tehran’s synagogues, and the exhibition was meant to honor this donation. The donors of the scroll were therefore invited to attend the opening of the exhibition.

The Chief Rabi, or Khakham as they are called in Iran, was accompanied by a junior Rabi who spoke English and served as his interpreter. When one of the visitors asked the Chief Rabi “for how long have you lent the scroll to the Library?” he jokingly answered that “contrary to the general belief that Jewish people cannot depart with their precious belongings, this was not a loan but a donation.” Furthermore, the junior Rabi revealed that he taught two days a week at the Holy City of Ghom, at a seminary of Talmudic studies organized for Shiite theology students. To the American visitors, it looked surreal: while the official propaganda in the US portrayed Iran as a country bent on exterminating the Jews, in Iran proper, Rabis were donating gifts to an institution that operated under the aegis of a Shiite shrine, joked around, and taught the Talmud to theology students in Ghom.

When this was related by my sister to Eugene Schulman, an antiquarian and bibliophile friend in Geneva, he took it upon himself to complement the Rabis’ generous gift with one of his own: he donated to the Malek Library a most rare volume, a copy of the first edition of the first translation of the Koran into English by George Sale, published in 1734.

Today, there are of course those who, like Eugene Schulman, despite being of Jewish faith, see through Israeli propaganda and prefer a cordial approach to animosity. There are also those who like the Freer and Sackler visitors—one third of whom were also of Jewish faith—want to have a first-hand opinion and visit Iran. But for a vast majority of the population at large, who remain at the mercy of the virulent Israeli propaganda machine, Iran has been so demonized that the threat of bombing, and the killing of thousands of innocent civilians, almost seems to be an accepted right of Israel!

Read full article with many links, photos, and several important videos.

Phi Beta Iota:  While Israel may still attack Iran after the November 2012 elections, Iran is not a nuclear threat and both Israel and the USA know this.  Right now the primary purpose of the Iran “threat” is to drive oil prices up so really evil bets made on oil futures pay off, and to distract the world from the dramatic expansions of the settlements–not that we oppose them, but in the absence of a legitimate coherent Palestinian state with no ghettos and no walls, we do not believe the US taxpayer should be paying a single cent for anything having to do with Israel (or Arab militaries).

See Also:

<Iran Israel nuclear> at Phi Beta Iota