Tobey Talk
Saturday, December 27, 2003
Judith-
Though it’s off topic, I was very glad up brought up the matter of Howard Dean. It gives me an opportunity to try to correct the record. I am bypassing the humor group because, as you note, this is not funny.
We are all victims when corporate media slurs the tellers of truth.
As a former Peace Corps Volunteer whose service to his country did not involve a uniform, I think Dean’s response was well within the province of supplying potentially useful information to the poll taker - going beyond what was asked for. Howard Dean makes it very clear in his auto-biography that neither he nor his family know why his brother was listed by the American military forces as MIA-POW. His brother and a friend were taken prisoner and, according to witnesses, executed a few months later. Howard says they have speculated that his brother could have been doing work for the CIA, but that they have no specific knowledge about it. The military has kept a close eye on the effort to find the brother and also kept the Dean family informed of developments, which I presume has been the case of MIA-POW persons in whom our government has had more than casual interest. It is the Pentagon who implied Howard’s brother was serving by its assignment of the military-like status to a person, certainly not in uniform and certainly not "a living relative".
As a political candidate, Howard Dean stands head and shoulders above any we have been used to. He is truthful and he does what he says he will do. He would make an excellent President. Our country desperately needs leaders who use thought rather than ideology and put the interests of the citizens above those of their crony’s portfolios. It is a little hard to criticize Bush, since he seems to believe the lies he parrots. Bush is a "born-again" former drunk and, some say, coke-head. One can appreciate his achievement of staying off the booze and away from the dope, but his sense of reality is clearly far from intact.
Saddam Hussein, a former American CIA beneficiary, was unappreciative when he rejected the Cheney-Rumsfeld proposal of a pipeline deal about 15 years ago, during the time he was gassing the Kurds with American supplied chemicals. Neither Cheney or Rumsfeld have forgotten the snub. Later he invaded Kuwait AFTER getting a tacit go-ahead from the American State Department. The invasion gave the USA an anticipated excuse to start the long planned invasion. Saddam was left in place, since he kept the lid on the animosity between the Sunnis and the Shiites. Saddam’s unrealistic dreams of leading the Moslem world into modern importance led him to continued defiance of what he foolishly expected to be an honorable American administration. His first mistake was turning down the pipeline deal. His second was supposing the CIA wouldn’t figure out he had no WMD. Perhaps they did.
Howard Dean, whose record for good government as a Governor, has been well supported by Republicans and Democrats alike, was one of many reasonably informed Americans who have not been fooled. He is one of the few in public life who has presented the facts, available to anyone who cares to check them out.
I truly hope you will devote some of your own time to discovering the truth and, only on having done so, become politically active in a helpful way.
Sincerely,
Tobey
From: Judith
To: rude_toons4u@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, December 25, 2003 1:45 PM
Subject: [rude_toons4u] Howard Dean lies again - This is not funny
Dean Rebuked for Statement Implying Brother Served in Military
New York Times
23 Dec 2003
Howard Dean came under criticism from an Iowa newspaper last weekend for an
answer to a questionnaire in which he implied that his brother was serving
in the military when he disappeared in Laos 29 years ago. His brother had
been traveling in Southeast Asia as a tourist.
Asked by The Quad-City Times, which is based in Davenport, Iowa, to
complete the sentence "My closest living relative in the armed services
is," Dr. Dean wrote in August, "My brother is a POW/MIA in Laos, but is
almost certainly dead."
The brother, 23-year-old Charles Dean, whose apparent remains were
recovered by a military search team last month in Laos, was classified as
missing in action, along with other civilians captured or killed in the
area during the Vietnam War. But Charles Dean never wore a uniform, and
while some family members at times suspected that he was working as a spy,
Dr. Dean said he never believed that.
(additional excerpts...)
Mark Ridolfi, editor of the paper's editorial page, noted that the question
had specifically asked about the armed services and said of Dr. Dean's
reply, "It certainly is not an accurate response."
Mr. Ridolfi said the question, one of 20 that the candidates answered in
writing in August, was intended to get at candidates' personal connections
to the military. "When you have a family member currently involved in the
military," he said, "you think of things differently."
After hearing Dr. Dean's explanation during a meeting at the newspaper's
office on Friday, Mr. Ridolfi ran an editorial in Sunday's editions
describing Dr. Dean's original answer as "unusually revealing."
"Charlie Dean's capture and death in Southeast Asia certainly shaped his
brother's opinion about the American military," read the editorial, which
pointed out that the younger Dean opposed the Vietnam War, worked on George
McGovern's 1972 presidential campaign and visited Laos during a yearlong
trip around the world.
"Knowing that story tells us something about the candidate," it continued.
"So does inaccurately implying a direct family connection to the armed
services for the 72,000 Quad Citians who received Sunday's newspaper."
(Dean is another Clinton in his anti-war anti-military views)
Thursday, December 25, 2003
Correspondent -
Talking it over with my spiritual guide, I find myself thinking the head-on approach would probably not be the most effective. The security guard who sounded the alarm when he found a bomb at the Atlanta Olympics was hounded by the FBI for months. The "person of interest" relating to the Anthrax scares has had his professional life destroyed.
The great moral catastrophe that has engulfed the United States is the acceptance by the general public of the idea that there is such a thing as a disposable person. Every human who has achieve any spiritual stature in history will without hesitation affirm this is a serious error. One should never make this error with reference to oneself or to anyone else. That such an idea can be entertained, gives the lie to those who claim to have democratic ideals.
The willingness of American government officials to send troops and bombs to kill Iraqi civilians, as well as sending American kids to do it.
As I write the author of "The Da Vinci Code" is speaking on C-SPAN. It looks like I'll have to read the book!
Tobey
Republicans, Democrats, Greens, Independents –
Had enough terror yet? Are you poor enough yet?
Are enough freedoms millions died for gone yet?
Check out Howard Dean for President, and
Do your part to Save your country!
Friends:
A while back [we circulated a mailer] ... about depleted uranium. Here is a link a report on what it is like to be on the receiving end of American ordinance. Get ready for some stuff way more gross than [the usual cartoony distractions], and quite without humor.
Spelled out: http://www.einswine.com/atrocities/du/
In recent talks Sri Harold Klemp has given a lot of attention to special people in times ancient and recent who worked to raise the prevailing levels of spiritual freedom in their countries and the world. Of course, the Kal must maintain a zero sum, and the more ECK, Divine Spirit, channeled in, the more negativity is needed to balance, lest the lower worlds won’t float off the God Worlds chart. Still, for me seeing the United States once again respected as a deserving feature in the civilized world.
Not only was Saddam not a threat to the U.S.A., he may have served a Tito-like role, keeping feuding factions in line, the Sunnis and the Shiites. After Tito died we had the major bloodbaths of the former Yugoslavia. By killing and torturing quarter million detractors he may have prevented a war between Shiites and Sunnis, which Iran would certainly have joined, then Syria, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, and, with nuclear weaponed Israel in the crossfire, who knows what horrors could have ensued. It was not without thought that the first Golf war stopped short of taking him out.
There are presently two excellent presidential candidates to replace Bush, Howard Dean, former governor of Vermont, and General Clark. I’ve been following the debates and the campaign very closely, and these two stand head and shoulders above all the others. I’m active in the Dean campaign, having collected petition signatures to have him on the New York ballot and also for delegates. He has way more grass roots support than any of the old, now quite jealous, pols.
As I write I’m listening to a fascinating C-Span program with Major General Ray Smith about the recent invasion of Baghdad and how very different it was anything expected. As the marines approached, Iraqi officers would slink away leaving the troops. Then, the troops would take off their uniforms and walk home. Since some prisoners were needed, marines would say, “Come here buddy,� to someone picked at random from the numbers of walkers. These would become prisoners.
Hope you find this interesting!
Tobey
Republicans, Democrats, Greens, Independents –
Had enough terror yet? Are you poor enough yet?
Are enough freedoms millions died for gone yet?
Check out Howard Dean for President, and
Do your part to Save your country!
Each moment a new tale is shouting to be told in silence..
Rumi
Monday, December 22, 2003
Will the New York Times print this?
Subject: Survivor Buyoff - Liability Insurance for Bush!
Dear Editor,
American ability to convert anything - even grief - to money reaches new heights with the Victim Compensation Fund. Police and firefighters knowingly risked their lives to save others, and ultimate service merits compensation. But, the many Americans who were killed that same awful month by drunk drivers, drive-by-shooters, hospital errors, and other "actionable" mishaps, did nothing more or less than most of the terrorist victims to merit mega-compensation. They were killed in the wrong place! The airlines had no reason to suspect the 19 travelers were terrorists, and suits against Airlines could be summarily dismissed - with stipulation that lessons be learned - for the good of the industry and the traveling public.
Could the real reason for a government deadline and survivor signoff pressure be to shield President Bush from suits for doing nothing with advance warning of the attacks?
Tobey Talker
Saturday, December 20, 2003
I’ve been calling on neighbors with petitions for Howard Dean and New York primary ballots. This morning, as I cooked the family pancakes, I watched General Clark do the same on C-Span. He too looks very good. I think both Presidential candidates stand head and shoulders above the competition for competence, intelligence, ability, common sense, vision, and honesty – all things, except for competence, the present administration lacks! (With Bushies’ competence in the service of greed, bigotry, and vanity war, one could wish they had less!)
The parenthesis above may need clarification. We love to wring our hands about the quarter million of his detractors Saddam killed and otherwise discouraged by applying extreme pain. We don’t even think of the millions alive today (except for the thousands we killed, orphaned or maimed with bombs and midnight house raids) – alive today because Saddam’s régime blocked for 40 years the tradition of mutual slaughter between Shia’s and Sunnis over who succeeded their successor-less prophet. The death of Tito signaled the start of a bloodbath in the former Yugoslavia. Time will show what calamities befall from the costly removal of a non-threat to the United States and its real friends. Without the United Nations stamp of approval, the USA had no legal basis or jurisdiction for “police” action in Iraq. A billion dollars is $4.00 for every American man, woman and child. Do the math! We have gone in two years from beacon of hope to the free world to pariah among civilized people everywhere - except regimes parasitic to taxpayer handouts like Egypt, Israel, and now the band of puppet-thieves pillaging Iraq.
Well, it’s not all bad. My position is that God created these worlds and their troubles so we’d have the opportunity to learn about love – by practicing it in everything we do – and then move on to more spiritually “adult” missions. We’re in a sort of kindergarten whose only function is to be just that.
NPR’s “All Things Considered” had wonderful interview with Bart Ehrman about his new book, Lost Christianities: The Battle for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew. He sheds much needed scholarly light on Marcion and Christian views closer to the original than any seen in millennia. The Allah of the Saddam’s of the world is the Old Testament Jehovah who rules by terror and false promise. Jehovah is also worshiped by “Christians” with Crusader mentalities and "Zionists" bent usurping Palestinian land. The only God I love and worship (known to Rumi, St. Paul, and Apollonius of Tyana and Zadoc of Solomn's temple and some Cabalists, to name a few) gives love to all and knows each will eventually be drawn back to It when the games of greed and religio-ethnocentric killing have lost their fascination. This will never happen to any large segment of any population, but it eventually happens with each and every Soul - whether in this life or some other. Allah-Jehovah, meanwhile, must maintain a balance of good and evil so his dominions don’t disappear. Such evil as current American terrorism and support of terrorism by proxy creates much opportunity for the best of the American spirit to un-king another George. I, for one, with life, fortune, and sacred honor, am in!
Tobey Talker
Footnotes:
Marcion
(mär´shen, mär´seen) , c.85-c.160, early Christian bishop, founder of the Marcionites, one of the first great Christian heresies to rival Catholic Christianity. He was born in Sinope. He taught in Asia Minor, then went (c.135) to Rome, where he perfected his theory. In 144 he was excommunicated from the church. He then formed a church of his own, which became widespread and powerful. Marcion taught that there were two gods, proclaiming that the stern, lawgiving, creator God of the Old Testament, and the good, merciful God of the New Testament were different. He considered the creator god the inferior of the two. Marcion also rejected the real incarnation of Christ, claiming that he was a manifestation of the Father. Though generally seen as one of the most important leaders of the somewhat loosely defined movement known as Gnosticism, he did not share some of the main premises of other Gnostic sects. He believed in salvation by faith rather than by gnosis; he rejected the Gnostic emanation theory; and he sought truth in his own truncated version of the New Testament, which included only 10 of the so-called Pauline Epistles and an edited version of St. Luke. He completely rejected the Old Testament. He explained in his Antitheses that since Jewish law was often opposed to St. Paul, all passages in the Bible that suggested the Jewish foundation of Christianity should be suppressed, even including such statements by St. Paul (see antinomianism ). Marcionism emphasized asceticism and influenced the developments of Manichaeism , by which it was later absorbed. Its effect on orthodox Christianity was to cause a canonical New Testament to be assembled and promulgated and the fulfillment of the Old Law in the New Law to be clearly enounced. Back to letter...
Source: http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/M/Marcion.asp
Tuesday, December 16, 2003
Mark Anderson wrote in The American Sentimentalist to which this replies....
Hey, Mark, just because mankind thinks a certain way for 40,000 years - gosh, that's only 14,610,000 days! - it doesn't mean mankind must think that way for 14,610,001! In fact, it seems there are, de facto, 14,610,000 reasons for trying something else. And that's only going back to one of the 6 cute daughters of Eve.
But seriously, we are each individuals. We like to think of the amorphous mass of humanity with its infinitely myriad webs of collective consciousnesses (group-thinks) as something to which we are hopelessly tied and responsible for. If we choose it, its a self-fulfilling prophesy. Better, I think, is to partake of the world's better offerings as utility strikes and be its benefactor as time and talent allow. The existentialists buy the illusion that there is no reality beyond what their lower senses sense and the vanity of their ultimately drab thoughts. Were they right, they would not be able to choose their own tedious outlook or any other. Essence and existence are just words. Both are symbols of abstractions, the first without useful definition and the second only dimly understood. Life is about purposeful play. It is about using the creative imagination. It is all about love - but not the selfish kind. There are rules.
What would be the point of a game whose outcome you could predict? As our game improves, we seek more challenging fields, higher mountains, greater causes. If we think the point is to save the world from war, greed, and bad T. V., we are in for some very rude awakenings. Yet our power to shape our personal states of being is without limit. If we do it right, a better world is a side-effect - one soon undone by the myriad webs.
And we get better at it - if we work at it. We take a few steps forward and then some backward. We repeat the same lessons enough times until we learn from them. Eventually we pass on to other spheres of activity, leaving the world to some beginning where began and others stuck in the ruts of their negative philosophies, their quests for power, or their dreams of utopia. They are no different from ourselves...
TobeyTalker
Wednesday, December 10, 2003
12/11/2003
Wise men have said good and evil in the world is always in a zero sum balance. What a good thing it is to sit comfortably and reflect upon the good-evil interplay! The trick is to reflect in a way that helps others get above good and evil with a spiritual viewpoint. It is not that good is bad; one person's idea of good may often be another's idea of bad. Is it always? Viewing from detached spiritual freedom, one can love participating in the drama.
Doing PC housekeeping while CSPAN brings the best TV I've seen yet. It is odd that it's taken me so long to discover it, since it's now been on for 25 years. Jeran Prendergast, Undersecretary-General for Political Affairs at the U.N. is holding a press review. How sane his views are when contrasted with the greedy outlaw cowboys from the American government warring on once friendly countries. What has the world come to when the simple demonstration of sanity from a TV talking head seems remarkable!
Cat Mystie jumps in my lap. Her purrs are quite loud for a smallish domestic tabby. She can purr and lick my hand at the same time. She's unconcerned whether I can type while she does it. Of our five cats, she's the only mouser.
Democratic Senators are saying wonderful things they would do and problems they would solve if and when they become president. My question for them is, since you, Sir/Madam, are a United States Senator, why haven't you been a lot more forceful in bringing about the wonderful solutions and advances in your present capacity, which is among the most powerful on the planet?
Saw parts of the debate last night. Howard Dean stood head and shoulders above the rest. The whining, the jealousy, the bickering, and the resentment of the lesser candidates, over Gore's support for Bush has begun. All would now be better choices, thinks this former Republican, than George Bush, But many good comments were made by almost all candidates about what to do about Iraq now that we have made such a mess. Tax-paying middle class citizens whose hard earned donations brought Dean to the notice mainstream pols should not go unmentioned.
Al Gore's Dean support speech made many important points not otherwise generally made. Dean saw and expressed the truth about the war in Iraq well ahead of anyone else in the political field. Dean has many years of excellent performance in an executive position and has earned the trust of those he served and his fellow governors in both parties.
The Bush administration continues to crank out foolishness. One wonders how much rope this gang of felons needs before they hang themselves. Now only "American" companies will be on the Carpet Bag Gravy Train. I wonder about the extent to which these "American" companies are owned by Saudis and Israelis - the ones whose mutual animosity was the real trigger for the war, though Bush crony greed is the motive.
Now a Whitehouse press secretary is spinning the lastest expression of Bush crony favoritism to the heard of corporate reporters who could probably serve the world better by not giving him airtime.
Friday, December 05, 2003
Just added this byline for search purposes. Webmasters are invited to use it for linking pages to Tobey Talk.
Promotes spiritual freedom, touches life, love, world events, and politics seen by an American Constitution advocate and defender who loves life and disapproves of tyranny in all forms including political, social and especially religious.
Tobey
Thursday, December 04, 2003
Bean-
You should start one of these. Be careful about including actual names. You will recognize any persons mentioned. Copied copy is expurgated.
We’ll never know whether Al Gore would have been worse than Bush. It’s safe to say he has no more sense of the obvious (as in causes of 9/11) than Bush. Clinton was pretending to fight terror when bombed a pharmaceutical company, killing people, destroying a family business, and dis-employing the surviving workers. He did this just when the heat for the Monica affair demanded the most distraction I had no big problem with his private sex escapades – Hillary’s problem, not mine - but lying before the grand jury about his habitual abuse of women (the “bimbo alerts” as his staff called the frequently surfacing allegations of victims) was a serious crime.
Hillary’s reply to my admonition to oppose the bombing of innocents in Iraq before it happened – when it was a good bet Saddam was not a threat to the U.S. – was “The world would be a better place without Saddam Hussein.”
Thousands think the would be a better place without the Clintons, Hillary in particular. They are spooked by such a bright and gutsy woman with so much power. But, have they less right to apply their criteria for winnowing humanity than does Hillary? The idea that some people are better than others and have a natural right to kill the ones they are better than is certainly alive and well. The idea is implicit in our growing our supply of weapons of mass destruction while demanding that others, on pain of being bombed, don’t even think of acquiring them. I reject the belief of some I won’t name that Hillary was behind the apparent suicide of the lawyer the Clintons brought with them to Washington. I recently saw Linda Trip on Larry King Live. I was amazed at how my view of her had been so formed by the press without my even knowing. She had for months made it plain to Monica, her colleague, that she, Trip, a career public servant, duty bound to expose corruption, would not participate in lying to prosecutors about events that had become routine in the Whitehouse. The titillating nature of the least significant part of the testimony completely masked the significance of the actual crimes committed. Remember, Clinton “did not have sex with that woman,” and he “did not order anyone to lie...” Had the tape not been replayed, I’d have totally forgotten the REALLY IMPORTANT thing he “did not” do!
Much of the wrong done by the U.S.A. for which the 9/11 attack was “payback”, intended to dissuade and curtail, happened under Clinton’s watch. Of course he had only been in charge for 8 of the 25 or so years during which the pressures were building, but a lot could have been done to reverse the POLICY of paying off terrorists, thereby inducing them to keep upping the ante, that became the great gusher of tax dollars started by Jimmy Democrat Carter at Camp David.
Peoples get the leaders they deserve. Except in extraordinary times, (the Roosevelt era and World War II?) the leaders represent the common character denominators of the people who by following choose them. The only other qualities needed to propels a social leader to the top of the greasy pole are the ruthlessness to eliminate enemies and charm fool the smart. Bush, and Saddam have had it all. Clinton was smart enough not to need ruthlessness. That his flaws were so crippling is true tragedy. Gore, of course, would transparently lie even when the truth would have been to his advantage! That he was so popular is telling about the electorate. Gore’s time came and went when he declined to replace Clinton at the impeachment. I hope we, the electorate, are wiser now....!
The mix of greed, arrogance, and anti-anything not Judeo-Christian that induces so many to subscribe to the mass hysteria of “War on Terror,” pumped out in a steady stream of propaganda from Washington, is characteristic of the American People. Where it not, the Bushies would have been long gone. It is very convenient for the rest of the “free, civilized” world to think they would be more bound by the rule of international law, had they such power, but the facts of history get in the way. A country with much more power than its neighbors has never been inclined to restraint. All statecraft from Waterloo to the time of Vietnam was based on the quest for “a balance of power.” The mutually assured destruction of the cold war, it is now pretty clear, was the only thing that kept Washington in check. After World War II one high American official considered Stalin – and the quality of Zionism, and thought to his dismay we had sided with the wrong dictator. He was quickly sidelined and, according to one surviving witness, assassinated. The bomb challenged countries have to get used to hegemony; sad but true!
Oh. I didn’t vote for Bush. I voted for the integrity and common sense he skillfully aped. I knew it was a long shot, but I was way off about how long.
Dad
"Seek the highest, and the rest of life will fall into place."
Thank you daddy! That's what I do. I'm a political activist. Although, in general, I focus more on causes (people and human-rights oriented causes) than on the people representing those causes. I think, though, in this election, I'll be much more person-oriented. (And if Hilary ever ran I'd be on her campaign in a second. She's done so much good for this country. She's done so much good for human rights. I do think it's disappointing that she signed the bill for the war. I'd like to try to understand why she did that. However, I feel that she is not a person motivated by personal material greed and so I feel that, even if she was wrong, perhaps she felt it was right at the time. I'd like to know more about it. Maybe she was duped. And also, everyone makes mistakes. My own father, clever and kind fellow that he is, actually voted for Bush! The impressive thing, daddy, is how you turned around.) I didn't really believe that Bush had a chance of winning last time. I don't want to let that happen again. Did you know that at the last election, I participated in regestering voters? I'd definitely like to do that again. I'm trying to find out as much about Dean as I can (as well as the others). I like him. And I think he's got a good chance of winning. Yes, I'll look into it more.
I've got to go. My application . . . is due today and I haven't finished.
I love you daddy! I had such a wonderful time at Thanksgiving! Thanks very much.
love,
--bean
