A "God" Gene?
Topic: Evolution
"...Why is spirituality such a universal force? Why do people from all walks of life, regardless of their religious backgrounds, value spirituality as much as, or more than, pleasure, power and wealth?

"The answer is, at least in part, hard-wired into our genes. Spirituality is one of our basic human inheritances. It is, in short, an instinct -- rooted in a "God gene" folded deep in the intricate strands of our DNA.

"This may sound like a controversial assertion, but it reflects the startling advances of modern biology. The question of "Is there a God?" may be beyond science, but a deeper understanding of why we believe in God may be within our grasp."

(Charlotte Observer article here.)

Days Of Future... Future
Topic: Religious Nuts
Rev. Jack van Impe presents:


Overview of Major Future Events Chart

(a beautiful new prophecy chart depicting a concise overview of future history.)

Eminem: Mosh
Topic: music


Imagine it pouring, it's raining down on us
Mosh pits outside the oval office
Someone's tryina tell us something,
Maybe this is god just sayin' we're responsible
For this monster, this coward,
That we have empowered
This is Bin Laden, look at his head noddin'
How could we allow something like this
without pumping our fists
Now this is our final hour

...Let the president answer a higher anarchy
Strap him with an Ak-47, let him go, fight his own war
Let him impress daddy that way
No more blood for oil, we got our own battles to fight on our own soil
No more psychological warfare, to trick us to thinking that we ain't loyal
If we don't serve our own country, we're patronizing a hero
Look in his eyes its all lies
The stars and stripes, they've been swiped, washed out and wiped
And replaced with his own face, Mosh now or die
If I get sniped tonight you know why,
Cause I told you to fight.

(complete lyrics here. review / video here)

Tape From California
Topic: music
Tape From California
Artist: Phil Ochs | Genre: Folk | Time: 46:55

Critic's Review
3 / 5

William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide

On his fourth album, Pleasures of the Harbor, Phil Ochs broke from both his topical songwriting style and his acoustic folk music approach for an album of long, poetic songs set to elaborate, eclectic arrangements. For its follow-up, Tape From California, he combined his earlier and more recent styles, addressing such issues as war and union organizing along with more discursive efforts, and including a few more complicated arrangements mixed in with simple guitar accompaniments. There were some directly political efforts, but in the more poetic songs, Phil Ochs seemed to be painting a portrait of a desperate, debased society and his own sense of personal decline. For example, the marathon "When in Rome" conflated images from slavery, the Nuremberg trials, and ancient Rome to compile a compendium of evil and decadence through the centuries, clearly implying that the present day was another such era. Phil Ochs imbued his lyrics with his characteristic sense of irony, and the arrangements by producer Larry Marks, Bob Thompson, and Ian Freebairn-Smith complemented the songs wittily. But released in the middle of 1968, the most tumultuous year of the tumultuous '60s, Tape From California was often hard to listen to, because it was such a frighteningly accurate portrait of its times, eerily mirroring the point at which passionate argument over the direction of the country spilled over into violence and a widespread sense of absurdity.

(mp3.com more here.)

Don't Mourn, Organize
Topic: presidential election
"I don't really want to analyze the results of the lection. I don't think we'll ever know if Bush actually won or if the voting machines built by the company whose CEO promised to "deliver [Ohio's] electoral votes to the President" in the election were rigged. I don't like the strange doublethink involved in saying that the exit polls were completely off in showing a Kerry lead, but then citing the same exit polls in saying that "moral issues" brought out an army of freedom hating Christians who want big government to enforce their religious views on abortion and homosexuality...

"It's time too ask yourself why you wanted to see Kerry win. Was it an end in itself, or merely a means to an end? Did you want to see Kerry win just because you like him as a person, or because you want better health care, better jobs, or an end to the war in Iraq?

"If it's the former, I don't know what to tell you. If it's the latter, then you need to simply keep fighting..."

(DavidGrenier.com more here.)

Bush Unbound
Topic: presidential election
"The Democrats surprised themselves at their ability to raise tens of millions of dollars, inspire hundreds of thousands of activists, spawn extensive new organizations, attract icons of popular culture and present themselves as unified around a centrist position. Expectations were not dashed. Turnout vastly increased among African-Americans and Hispanics. More than 60 percent of the newly registered voters went for John Kerry. Those concerned about the economy voted overwhelmingly for him; so did those citing the war in Iraq as an issue. But the surge of the Democrats was more than matched.

"Using the White House as a machine of centripetal force, Rove spread fear and fused its elements. Fear of the besieging terrorist, appearing in Bush campaign TV ads as the shifty eyes of a swarthy man or a pack of wolves, was joined with fear of the besieging queer. Bush's announcement that he favored a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage was underscored by referendums against it in 11 states, including Ohio -- all of which won. (more here.)

Let Them Eat Myth...
Topic: presidential election
I'm wondering if denying poor people a mythology - even if we know it to be false - is such a great idea. It's honest, and has more integrity, but it's a bad strategy for eliciting their support. Poor people would rather vote for the myth that they'll be taken care of - even if, in reality, it means being further fleeced by the wealthy, and sending their children off to die in war. (more: see Douglas Rushkoff)

What The Hell?
Topic: presidential election
"Moral values" is a semantic spook, you cannot put moral values in your pocket. "Moral values" will not sit in your stomach in place of food and it will not pay the bills.

---

Politics is, aside from suckling, the most primitive of human behaviors. A "politician" is someone that understands the dominance/submissive game and uses it to influence the behavior of those around him, hopefully to get rich or to get laid. Occassionally in life there are isolated acts that those of us outside of the "politics" game can use to improve our existence (supporting a candidate that will improve health care or working conditions, for example). If there is to be any freedom, any justice in this world survival needs must be met. But this compromise is not a full scale endorsement of the political system!

It has become apparent here at 1:30 AM EST that both Presidential candidates are doing pretty much the same, votes-wise. Living in the United States, no matter what your beliefs are there is a very good chance that at least every other person that you meet today will think you're a fucking idiot!

"The human position is no longer tenable," William S. Burroughs used to say. What we are experiencing is the chaos that persists and will only increase as American society discovers that it is no longer needed, at least in its present form.

If Kerry were to win we could expect, for starters: an increasingly vicious police state on our hands, an economic situation that is at best racist (and at worst, genocidal), and an ugly war in Iraq that is not going anywhere, anytime soon. This is the same thing we can expect from Bush, of course.

This recent election is only the backdrop for our play, however: one cannot allow one's life to be defined by the despair of their age (which is a constant in any age, I fear). All animals have strong biological drives towards nesting, congesting and digesting (sleep, fucking and food). We also have brain programming that can create feelings of love, transcendance, beauty, mercy...

Timothy Leary: Mind Mirror
Topic: the Medium is the Massage

Timothy Leary was eulogized by Hunter S. Thompson as "forgotten, but not gone." Leary was one of those cagey guys who have been jailed, chased from academia and the subject of cruel and heavy-handed smear campaigns, but his legacy just won't go away. From his Leary Interpersonal Grid (1957) (schemata of the basic personality types and how different aspects of one's personality interact) and Transpersonal Diagnoses of Personality (1958) through such works as Neuropolitique and Info-Psychology and beyond Leary's theories offered the individual the powerful opportunity to "map" or "model" their personality ("What am I thinking? Why am I thinking it? What can I do to change the parts that do not serve me?"). .

Leary was as fascinated and excited about the impact that electronic media and technology can have on consciousness in the 70s, 80s and 90s as he was about the possibilities of psychedelics in the 1960s. Mind Mirror is a computer program that he designed to let people discover their personality ("What is really going on up there in my head?").

The manual itself is fascinating, going into a lot of the theory behind the program. The interview with the man himself is priceless.

Read More...

The "sounds flat" blues.
Topic: by Lenny
Some middle aged white woman is cackling the "sounds flat" blues over the PA of this once serene cafe. Between lines of "lord have mercy, lord have mercy on me" a middle aged accountant picks out an indecipherable line on his hollow body guitar, each note more improbable -- and more unsonorous -- than the next. These instrumental breaks are highlighted by the arrhythmic twitch of the tambourine, which sounds more like a rattlesnake than a percussive instrument.

They stopped! Announcing a nine minute break. Silence has never sounded so good...

It was then the angel sang his melody.
-- Rainer Maria Rilke, "Annunciation To Mary."