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Poem: Utopia.............................................about noutopia
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An excerpt from Beyond
Words
By Sri
Swami Satchidananda
Galen 3/29/03
Your first duty is to find the peace in you. If you root yourself
in your
peace and then lend your hand, you will certainly bring peace.
If not, you will only add more and more to the peaceless condition.
Violence cannot
stop violence. A war can never really be won by violence alone.
The mind must be changed. A violent victory only means that you
have handicapped your enemy. He is still your enemy and the peace
is only temporary. You have covered the fire so it doesn't show
now, but it is still inside and one day it will flare up again.
When you win
a war with your power, your enemy simply retreats and waits for
an opportunity to strike back at you. You have won the war but
not the heart. Real victory is to win the heart, not just the
land or the political power.
Yoga tells you
that your own peaceful thoughts will bring results. In the name
of Yoga, we try to collect the mind and send out peaceful vibrations.
A sincere thought will travel all over the world. It is more
than an atomic bomb, it's more than a missile.
Even if you don't
believe in God or prayer, sit and say, "Let there be
peace. Let the minds of the people who want war be changed."
We believe in thought force. Because it is the very same thought
force that creates war. Remember that. It is the human mind that
creates all these bombs, all these wars.
If you still
want a war, fight it against undesirable thinking, not
against a nation of people. And to fight such a war, you have
to send out beautiful thoughts. Make every thought a powerful
anti missile. Sit quietly and send out powerful peaceful thoughts.
I'm not joking-it is possible. Even one minute spent in peace
is valuable. Don't think, "When our brothers are dying,
how can we sit quietly and think of peace?" This crazy world
is, in a way, stabilized because of people sitting for a few
minutes in meditation every day. Know that.
Don't ever think
that by raising your hand or throwing a bomb or shouting something
you can help the situation. Do it in a nonviolent way. Don't
hurt anybody, don't hate anybody. As long as you have hatred
in your mind, you are unfit to talk of peace.
Galen
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Returning
Dixie Chicks CDs
Kathy
Linker 3/29/03
A visitor
to noutopia sends this:
Letter from
radio station website in Lubbock, home of the Dixie Chick that
spewed forth about our president...
Name:
LT Layne McDowell
Date: 03/15/03
Time: 01:54:49 PM
Comment: An open
letter to the Dixie Chicks:
Earlier this
week, while performing in London, you stated that you were ashamed
that our President is from your home state. I wonder if you realized
how many Americans would be listening. This American was listening.
This Texan is ashamed that you come from my state. I serve my
country as an officer in the United States Navy. Specifically,
I fly F-14 Tomcats off carriers around the world, executing the
missions that preserve the very freedom you claim to exercise.
I have proudly fought for my country in the skies over Kosovo,
Iraq and Afghanistan without regret.
Though I may disagree wholeheartedly with your comments, I will
defend to the death your right to say them in America. But for
you to travel to a foreign land and publicly criticize our Commander
in Chief is cowardice behavior. Would you have so willingly made
those comments while performing for a patriotic, flag-waving
crowd of Texans in Lubbock. I would imagine not.
How dare you
pocket profits off songs about soldiers, their deaths and patriotism
while criticizing their Commander in Chief abroad, even while
they prepare to give their lives to ensure your own freedom of
speech. Please ask yourself, what have you done to deserve that
sacrifice? Do not try to justify your comments by claiming that
you made them only because you care about innocent lives. Never
once in our history have we committed troops to war for the purpose
of taking innocent lives. We do it to protect innocent lives,
even yours.
If the world
leaders of the late 1930's had the vision and courage of our
present Commander in Chief, perhaps the evil men who caused the
death of millions in WWII would have never had the opportunity
to harm a soul. The potential loss of millions of lives in the
future at the hands of today's evil men necessitate action.
In a separate
correspondence, I am returning to you each and every Dixie Chicks
CD and cassette that I have ever purchased. Never again will
I allow my funds to support your behavior. All you have done
is to add your name to a growing list of American "Celebrities"
who have failed to realize that they have obtained their successes
on the backs of the American blue-collar workers such as our
servicemen and women.
This Texan, this
American will continue to risk his life to guarantee your freedoms.
What will you do to deserve it?
^
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Contribute
to Howard Dean's campaign
Rick Barnard
3/26/03
Hi
Friends and Family,
Howard Dean (Vermont's ex governor) needs money this week to
qualify for matching funds for his presidential campaign. If
you're as disgusted (an understatement) as I am with Bush and
his war mongering administation please check out Dean's web site
and consider making a contribution. If you like what you see
forward this to other like minded people who might be interested
and help spread the word. He has opposed this crazy war from
the start and he actually comes relatively close to my politics.
Check out his website below.
Rick Barnard
FROM HOWARD DEAN
Thank you for your contribution to Dean for America. Your support
will help me share a new vision for America that includes: Guaranteed
access to quality health care for every American. An American
foreign policy that embraces multi-lateralism, and that would
seek to resolve conflicts in concert with our allies. A federal
budget that is balanced, because we can only have social justice
if we have a strong fiscal foundation.
Your continued
support is critical to our campaign's success. I hope you also
will consider inviting your family, friends, and associates to
visit www.deanforamerica.com and make a contribution
to our campaign.
With best wishes,
Howard Dean, MD
Dejavu all over again
From Jack
King 03/14/03
I
am old enough to remember the Alistair Cooke broadcasts during
WW2. Many of my friends have heard me refer to the similarities
between The situation in the world from 1933 to 1945 and how
the situation in Iraq is so similar in many ways. What Alistair
Cooke did not include in his parallel is the end result of appeasment
in Europe prior to World War II. That end result was the loss
of 28 million human beings which included 6 million Jews and
nearly 18 million Russians.
The sad part
is that Hitler could have been stopped, by proper action, at
almost any time until he invaded Poland. The really sad part
was that he had already told the world about his dreams for world
conquest in Mein Kampf which was written while he was in jail
during the early thirties.
Saddam Hussein
has not written a "Mein Kampf" but he has demonstrated
his ambition by wars with Iran and Kuwait that were a result
of his desire to dominate the Oil Fields of the Middle East.
I am sure, dreams of World domination would follow the domination
of the largest part of the Worlds energy supplies. How many Human
beings will have to die to allow the French, Germans, and Russians
to accumulate a few more Deutchmarks, Franks, and Rubels? His
score is up to 1.5 million Iraqies murdered, many of them by
his own hand. With his aquisition of Nuclear weapons, the death
toll could reach into the Billions.
Jack
PEACE FOR OUR
TIME
by Alistair Cooke,
BBC Broadcaster (he is ~95 years old)
About the author:
In 1936, the NBC network invited Alistair Cooke to do a weekly
broadcast of reflections on British life called London Letter.
Cooke then emigrated to the United States in 1937, and asked
the BBC to let him do the same thing in reverse. Eventually he
succeeded, and 'Letter
from America'
is now the longest running radio broadcast in human history.
In the process it has won a faithful worldwide audience of several
million and many friends in high places.
When Cooke was awarded an honorary knighthood in 1973, the Queen
is reputed to haveexpressed bewildered admiration a this ability
to sit down, week after week, and communicate so directly with
his audience.
I promised to lay off topic A - Iraq - until the Security Council
makes
a judgment on the inspectors' report and I shall keep that promise.
But I must tell you that throughout the past fortnight I've listened
to everybody involved in or looking on to a monotonous din of
words, like
a tide crashing and receding on a beach - making a great noise
and
saying the same thing over and over. And this ordeal triggered
a nightmare - a day-mare, if you like. Through the ceaseless
tide I heard a voice, a very English voice of an old man - Prime
Minister Chamberlain saying: "I believe it is peace for
our time" - a sentence that prompted a huge cheer, first
from a listening street crowd and then from the House of Commons
and next day from every newspaper in the land. There was a move
to urge that Mr. Chamberlain should receive the Nobel Peace Prize.
In Parliament
there was one unfamiliar old grumbler to growl out: "I believe
we have suffered a total and unmitigated defeat." He was,
in view of the general sentiment, very properly booed down. This
scene concluded in the autumn of 1938 the British prime minister's
effectual signing away of most of Czechoslovakia to Hitler. The
rest of it, within months, Hitler walked in and conquered. "Oh
dear," said Mr. Chamberlain, thunderstruck. "He has
betrayed my trust."
During the last
fortnight a simple but startling thought occurred to
me--every single official, diplomat, president, prime minister
involved in the Iraq debate was in 1938 a toddler, most of them
unborn. So the dreadful scene I've just drawn will not have been
remembered by most
listeners. Hitler had started betraying our trust not 12 years
but only
two years before, when he broke the First World War peace treaty
by occupying the demilitarised zone of the Rhineland.
Only half his troops carried one reload of ammunition because
Hitler
knew that French morale was too low to confront any war just
then and 10 million of 11 million British voters had signed a
so-called peace ballot. It stated no conditions, elaborated no
terms,
it simply counted the numbers of Britons who were "for peace."The
slogan of this movement was "Against war and fascism"
- chanted at the time by every Labour man and Liberal and many
moderate
Conservatives - a slogan that now sounds as imbecilic as "against
hospitals and disease." In blunter words a majority of Britons
would do anything, absolutely anything, to get rid of Hitler
except fight him. At that time the word preemptive had not been
invented, though today it's a catchword. After all the Rhineland
was what it said it was - part of Germany. So to march in and
throw Hitler out would have been preemptive - wouldn't it?
Nobody did anything
and Hitler looked forward with confidence to
gobbling up the rest of Western Europe country by country - "course
by course," as growler Churchill put it. I bring up Munich
and the mid-30s because I was fully grown, on the verge of 30,
and knew we were indeed living in the age of anxiety. And so
many of the arguments mounted against each other today, in the
last fortnight, are exactly what we heard in the House of Commons
debates and read in the French press. The French especially urged,
after every Hitler invasion, "negotiation, negotiation."
They negotiated so successfully as to have their whole country
defeated and occupied. But as one famous French leftist said:
"We did anyway manage
to make them declare Paris an open city - no bombs on us!"
In Britain the
general response to every Hitler advance was disarmament and
collective security. Collective security meant to leave every
crisis to the League of Nations. It would put down
aggressors, even though, like the United Nations, it had no army,
navy or air force. The League of Nations had its chance to prove
itself when Mussolini invaded and conquered Ethiopia (Abyssinia).
The League didn't have any shot to fire.
But still the
cry was chanted in the House of Commons - the League and collective
security is the only true guarantee of peace. But after the Rhineland
the maverick Churchill decided there was no collectivity in collective
security and started a highly unpopular campaign for rearmament
by Britain, warning against the general belief that Hitler had
already built an enormous mechanised army and superior air force.
But he's not
used them, he's not used them - people protested. Still for two
years before the outbreak of the Second War you could read the
debates in the House of Commons and now shiver at the famous
Labour men - Major Attlee was one of them - who voted against
rearmament and still went on pointing to the League of Nations
as the saviour. Now, this memory of mine may be totally irrelevant
to the present crisis. It haunts me. I have to say I have written
elsewhere with much conviction that most historical analogies
are false because, however strikingly similar a new situation
may be to an old one, there's usually one element that is different
and it turns out to be the crucial one. It may well be so here.
All I know is
that all the voices of the 30s are echoing through 2003.
"We sleep safely in our beds because rough men stand ready
in the night to visit violence on those who would harm us.”
George Orwell
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Response from an old
friend
From Ray
Dee - 3/14/03
I
doubt that you like William Safire any better than I like Paul
Krugman, but both are responsible journalists who check their
facts. Yesterday, Safire's article covered the China-France-Syria
connection providing ultra high-tech rocket fuel (not for little
El Samouds but for big Intermediate range). Both the French and
the Germans have been making money selling very bad chemicals
to the Iraqi regime. I just don't see that French (and German
and Chinese) opposition is based on principle - I think they
each have a lot to hide, and a lot to answer for. France is the
#1 contractor for Iraqi oil. Their behaviors since WWII has been
reprehensible, including the disasters they left behind in their
colonies.
I also find it interesting that perhaps the three most anti-Semitic
nations in the world - Russia, France and Germany - each sit
on the security council and each oppose military action - the
French oppose it under any circumstances.
When I watch the film of European or American protest marches,
I see banners labeling Bust a fascist, signs calling the USA
the world's greatest threat to peace, placards calling for a
Palestinian state, Sharon pictured as the devil, anti-Zionist
diatribes, etc, etc. I have yet to see anything about the suffering
Saddam has brought to the world. Nothing about the horrible treatment
of Christians throughout the Arab world. Not a word about the
treatment of women in the Arab world. Nothing about the vile
hate the spews from every mosque and minaret in the Middle East
day after day. And certainly, nothing about 9/11 or terrorism,
or state-sponsored terrorism.
So I pretty much see that the opposition is, by and large, partisan
and unreasonable and anti-US to such a degree that it has nothing
of value to say to me as an individual.
Finally, I did read Sy Hersh's piece about Richard Perle - and
I thought it pretty slender stuff, a little nasty and not up
to Hersh's usual work - which I generally like and respect.
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Here's a better
way to spend 15 billion dollars, avoid war, and more effectively
serve George Bush's primary constituency... which is what a capitalist
free market society is all about, no?
From Rick
Barnard - 3/8/03
Our beloved President is offering
Turkey $15,000,000,000 to allow us to station 62,000 troops
in their country. That comes out to $241,935 per soldier. I bet
we could give each Iraqi soldier $1,000 to put down their weapons
and quit. That would leave about 14.5 billion left over that
we could spend in our own country to help States build schools,
provide medical care to children, and supply drugs to old people.
Maybe even Bush would have enough left over to give another tax
break to rich people.
If
he would do it, it would work: Pope as human shield
from
Galen - 3/8/03
Friends,
Now and then a message comes
across my desk that I know I must pass on. Several days ago a
friend forwarded an email to me from Helen
Caldicott regarding a way we could assure an end to possible
war in Iraq, and I have to agree that this could work.
As you probably know, Pope John Paul II is adamantly against
this war and has called it "a defeat for Humanity."
He sent an emissary to Iraq and Washington to deliver a personal
message and continues to urge political leaders to protest a
possible US led invasion. If there is one person whose life George
Bush would be unwilling to risk it would be the Pope's. Therefore,
millions of people around the world are being asked to email,
fax or even telephone His Holiness asking him to personally station
himself in Baghdad until a proper solution can be found. If he
would do it, it would work.
I would like to suggest we take
this request one step further. The Pope has been a strong voice
for peace and reconciliation for many years now, and has called
the spiritual leaders of the world together twice to pray for
peace in Assisi. I suggest the Pope call another gathering of
spiritual leaders opposed to war and violence in Iraq, imploring
them to join him in a statement George Bush cannot ignore. If
they gather in Baghdad and ask the people of the world to join
them in prayer, then the war will not happen. Then the inspectors
would have more time to do their work and apolitical solution
would surely be found.
I have already emailed the Pope
and I ask you to do the same. Also, please forward this email
to as many people as you can, for it will be hard for His Holiness
to ignore the requests of millions of people. I consider this
a spiritual solution coming from religions that have in the past
been the cause of so much separation. Please help us spread the
word for this important mission.
Please send your email to: accreditamenti@pressva.va.
If you would like to send a fax from the US, the number is: 011-39-06698-85378
(from other countries drop the 011 prefix), and to phone call:
011-39-06-69-82.
Imagine the impact of such a
statement of peace from the leaders of the world's religions
from Iraq. Let this be a "Victory for Humanity." It
is the eleventh hour. The war may begin any day now. Please do
not wait letting the Pope hear your important voice.
In Peace,
Galen
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