The Never Ending Neo Con Fantasy

After eight years of failed NeoCon New American Empire fantasies, which only resulted in the rise and empowerment of a host of anti American world wide web of terrorist net works, when an American administration has the most unprecedented string of successes in over 20 years in dealing with the problem, the best thing the biggest blowhard of the Neo Cons, Ex UN Ambassador, John Bolton can say is "we shouldn't read more into it than there is."
It is unthinkable to Bolton that he could give credit to the Obama administration in eliminating Bin Laden or the two dozen other top terrorists which has resulted in the virtual dismantling of Al Qaeda or the ouster of Gaddafi. You almost have to think that the reluctance is based in the fear that to acknowledge the reality would somehow be the admission to their utter failure in dealing with any of these problems and more so, the ultimate  responsibility of creating these problems in the first place.
This point was brought home yesterday when Barack Obama announced the elimination of American born radical Muslim cleric, Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen. al-Awlaki was at the height of his powers. He had a hand recruiting and planning almost all the high-profile terror attempts in recent years. He helped recruit Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the "underwear bomber". He had been exchanging emails with the Fort Hood massacre shooter, Major Nidal Hasan. He had been in communication with the failed Times Square bomber, Faisal Shahzad and had directed the attempted bombing of cargo planes last year.
This was another major blow to the infrastructure that remained of Al Qaeda.
In an interview with FOX News, Bolton said: 
"At the same time, I think it’s important as individual Al Qaeda figures and other terrorists are killed that we not read more into it than there is. Consider this analogy if you were around in the 1920s and somebody said, my God, Vladimir Lenin is dead. The Bolsheviks will never recover from this. [...]

So while Al-Awlaki death is significant, I would not read cosmic consequences into it."

Watch it:

Politely, I would say that Boltons analogy is seriously flawed as Lenin died of natural causes after a period of semi-retirement from politics. This is the serial denial and the manipulation of reality that Bolton uses to keep Americans living in his fantasy. He is strong! The Conservatives are strong! Barack Obama is weak on foreign policy.  

In spite of the Obama administrations real successes, he gets almost no credit from the American public.

This  because conservative media personalities and Republican lawmakers consistently mislead the public on Obama’s foreign policy, suggesting he is weak on terror and maligning his stance as “leading from behind.” There has never been any basis in reality to their attacks, and even less so after the killing of Al-Awlaki. But Bolton’s performance on Fox yesterday suggests that even this latest incident won’t make conservatives acknowledge reality. Another fine example of the smudged, crudely drawn line between neo con radical conservativism and utter madness.

Hello Dali

This seems to be Dali week at thebrainpolice. This is a fascinatingly bizarre and insightful interview of Dali by Mike Wallace in 1958. Wallace seemingly is attempting to demystify Dali, but becomes totally behoodled in the process. Remember to smoke Parliament Cigarettes while viewing this video.

Parliament, the only cigarette with 36,000 tiny nicotine traps in each filter....

Le Meilleur Porteur Americain en France!

Yes, I've come out...this is what I did 8 hours a day for 2 weeks. We figured a porteur walks between 24 and 28 kilometers a day and sometimes a wimp like me carries my own body weight.

And, of course, the thrilling finale of the Fete du Patrimone in St. Emilion on Sept. 18, 2011.

The best Feu d'artifice I've ever seen!

kafkaesque 29 sept 2011

run chris, run

If you needed yet more evidence of how desperate Republicans are for a new bright and shiny object next year you only had to watch the worshipful embrace of Gov. Christie tonight at the Reagan Library. After his speech no less than three of the five questions he took were from audience members imploring him to reconsider and enter his name for the Republican presidential nomination.

"Your country needs you!" (to run for president), said one lady, beseechingly. And with rapturous applause, the audience rose as one for yet another standing ovation.

I am dedicating this 1965 song, Who'll Be The Next In Line? by the Kinks to Governor Christie, the next bright and shiny object, the latest dull gleam at the bottom of the box of factory second costume jewelry who will learn about the heartbreak and the heart burn caused by the tragic inability of the Republicans to focus on anything for more than 30 seconds at a time.
Run, Chris, Run. See Chris Run....
aww, he broked.....

which side are you on?

 The NYPD officer caught on video macing peaceful female "Occupy Wall Street" protesters at close range, then "slinking away," has been identified. And doxed by Anonymous. "Before you commit atrocities against innocent people, think twice," the intro to "BadCop D0x" begins. "WE ARE WATCHING!!! Expect Us!"

In todays NY Times, the NYC Police Department releases a statement defending the bizarrely cruel and atrocious behavior of the white shirt clad police offiicial who pepper sprays the women who have been kettled in the face as somehow appropriate. They go on to trot out the fascist cliche of the oppressor being somehow "The Victim" after Anonymous outs the bastard and publishes his identity and his previous criminal anti social brutal behavior.
Tony Bologna is a serial sadist who is presently being sued for his actions in 2004, when he engaged in the same behavior during the Republican Convention in NYC. The NYPD and the Times are equally guilty here by trying to gloss over this incident which was broadcast internationally as a result of the need to aggressively deal with the "inevitable" rise in social protests as a result of the "inevitable " economic disaster already in progress. In other words, the media and the PR of the police forces are trying to inure us to the spectacle of violent and sadistic repressive tactics to discourage your right to speak out.

What the Times does not report is the fact that today, over 100 NYC Police Officers conducted their own job action, refusing to work in solidarity with the Protestors. This was an international embarrassment for NYC. Unfortunately, it takes an internationally televised action like this, and the ensuing attempt by citizens to obtain justice to draw focus on the brutal idiocy, the over kill, the psychotic free agents within the law enforcement agency to publicize the issues that propelled the Occupy Wall Street Protest. It's time for Americans to get up off of their lethargic asses and show the world which side they are on really on before it's too damn late.

TAKE ACTION
If you think Deputy Inspector Bologna should be fired and prosecuted for his abuse of power, file an on-line complaint with:

• Mayor Michael Bloomberg: http://www.nyc.gov/html/mail/html/mayor.html
• and, NYPD Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly:http://www.nyc.gov/html/mail/html/mailnypd.html
• and, the NYC Civilian Complaint Review Board:https://www.nyc.gov/html/ccrb/html/complaint.html
   

I've had a house full of guests since I got back from the Vendange in Neac
 and haven't had much access to my computer, but tonight everything changes...
I have to get moving now as it's time for my 2:15 pm disco lesson

Forever's A Long Long Time.....

Sit back, relax, 17 minutes  of a voyage along the thin line we all walked on between Cass and Second Avenue in Detroit City. A place where Hank Williams, Herbie Hancock,Sweet Peak Atkinson Kris Kristoffereson, Merle Haggard and Wayne Kramer all somehow exist together in the same time and space thanks to Don Was and Francis Ford Coppola...

A lost masterpiece...

OOPSY

The last full day of work of the Vendange 2011 at Chateau Vieux Chevrol in Neac, a tractor pulling a trailer with a few tons of grapes accidentally noses into a ditch. After the initial freak out...the trailer is disengaged and manually pushed out of the way, then another tractor is separated from its trailer full of grapes and Monsieur Christian Ferry deftly engineers the rescue! Tres Bien! Merci, Christian!

The producers of this video assure the public that no humans were harmed during the filming..... 

the return of grapezilla

microdot taking a break after destroying half of tokyo,
now back in his lair chillin....

Autumn

I leave you with this inspiring poem by Percy Dovetonsils.

Back in 2 weeks?

Your Daily Duchamp

Glider Containing Water Mill in Neighboring Metals by Marcel Duchamp, 1913-1915. Oil and semicircular glass, lead, lead wire, 147 x 79 cm.

 The Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA.

Unca Rick Hurted Muh Pootie....

The high point of last nights Republican "Debate" occurred during a break.

"Hey White Mutha fukka...don' point tha' finguh at me...I Bite it off!"
Where's Security when you need them? They shudda been hosin' the entire freak show down!

And what time is it? I thought I knew...but I was just informed that it is GRAPE TIME! I will be leaving tomorrow afternoon heading back into the middle ages again for 2 weeks of hauling grapes on my back at Chateau Vieux Chevrol in Neac, France. So, maybe I'll post something before I go but if I don't,  I'll be back in about 14 days! a bientot!

grapezilla action shot

UBU ROI

Alfred Jarry

Alfred Jarry was a French writer who was born on September 8, 1873 and lived until November 1. 1907. In that short period, he managed to somehow invent surrealist, absurd theater and create a body of work of mindlessly brilliant anarchistic idiocy that manages to confound and influence western art over a century later. Among other things, he developed a body of work which became the inspiration of much early dada and surreal writing. He invented a nonsense, alternate pseudo science which he called Pataphysics

As a schoolboy, Jarry was a precocious, but deliquent trouble maker who ridiculed his superiors and began to write and perform plays that evolved into a body of work called The Ubu Plays. The character based on his obese physics teacher, an unfortunate Monsieur Hebert evolved into Pere Ubu, one of the most monstrous and astonishing characters in French literature.

an original woodcut of Pere Ubu by Jarry

In 1893, the 23 year old Jarry, who had managed in a short time to drink his way through his inheritance, premiered the first play, Ubu Roi. It would be impossible to really explain the play here, somehow he massacres the Macbeth storyline, but of course, Ubu would become the king of Poland, spurred on by his disgusting, nasty trollope of a wife. He punctures social, political and psychological reality and creates a stupid hilariously surreal absurd world ruled by the obese and obnoxious Ubu. The first line of the play is Ubus thunderous epithet, Merdre! Which is a more emphatic version of the word Merde, which means Shit....

In some of the later plays, Ubu's wife cuckolds him by having an affair with a geometry professor who has trained performing polyhedra. 

Jarry died in 1907 from his undeniable drug and absinthe addiction, but left a trail of brilliant incoherence in his path that somehow rudely set the curtains of classical art on fire and gave birth to the modern world in it's crudely absurdist glare. He left legends of bizarre behaviour in his wake; careening drunkenly around Paris on his bike with his face painted green with a loaded gun...living in an impossible apartment with such a low ceiling that no one could stand up in, but him as he was very short man.

a version of ubu from a recent
swedish production

I posted a piece of music by the brilliant Cleveland, Ohio group which took the name of Jarry's character, Pere Ubu. In 2010, the band released a collaborative work based on the Ubu Plays with the experimental British Filmakers, The Brothers Quay. The video above is an excerpt from the cycle. The Ubu Plays remain a source of inspiration today. The work of the Residents, much of the absurdist theater of today would not exist if Jarry hadn't created his absurd nihilistic idiocy in the late 19th century. I became obsessed with the work when I was a teen ager. I still am.

The Joke

This is actually Gilbert Gottfrieds appearance in the movie that was inspired by his performance of The Aristocrat Joke at the Hugh Hefner Friars Club Roast in Manhattan the night after 9/11/2001.

It's actually an abridged version of the "The Joke" and I am posting it due to popular demand.

Warning, if you are at work, or easily offended ears in the room, you might not want to play this at full volume....

Marketing Pain

A very good article in The Village Voice that demonstrates the political and economic marketing of September 11, 2001 and the price we continually pay to keep the profits flowing....
an excerpt: 
The September 11, 2001 attacks have been a symbol of many things and many causes, but like the lavish, flag-draped rebuilding of the site, it has also been a vehicle for enrichment. From corporations to politicians to government officials to nonprofits to the security industry to publishers to the health industry (not to mention the incidents of outright fraud over the years), many people have found ways to profit from one of the nation's biggest disasters. 9/11 has created an economy all its own.

9/11 Changed My Life

As we fall into the mindless maelstrom of self obsessed shared traumatic introspection, a sort of onanistic wave of introspective patriotic self abuse, reliving the pain, passing on the shards of memory, a sort of genetic mutation in our collective nationalistic DNA...in the days leading up to the tenth anniversary of the Destruction of the World Trade Centers, inundated by Television Movies alternatively somber and sensationalistic...a truly jingoistic marketing opportunity, a way to refresh our hate, a way to endlessly relive the pain, savor that feeling...as we are bludgeoned endlessly by political factions trying to gain any kind of traction, to claim it as their own...
Sometimes I feel the way America has internalized and obsessed on 9/11 borders of pornography. It became the way we lost our innocence. We will never be quite so free again. We let it happen by surrendering to our insecurity. We fear fear itself.
In this blog, I never wrote the story of my personal experience on 9/11. I have written the story on other blogs and I have made a few references to to it here. In 2007, I wrote a post, A Kind Of Pornography.
Because, I was in lower Manhattan that day only a short distance away from the World Trade Centers.
I saw first tower smoking from the roof of my East Village apartment and spent the next few hours on a bike first in Union Square , then on Greenwich as the second plane hit.
The smell, the insane cloud of dust rushing up 6th Avenue as I tried to escape to Central Park on bike as the first tower collapsed...then having to relive it all over and over again every time I was near a television in America and then when I finally could rebook my flight to France...this will remain with me the rest of my life.
Of course I felt personally attacked. Of course I felt unfocused rage and anger, but I was determined to find the focus for my rage. If I am angry, I want to know why I am angry and make sure my anger is not wasted on the wrong target. Gradually the feelings coalesced into a need to understand what had happened and why a group of people could feel strongly enough to destroy themselves in that insane act.
I felt I had to learn about Islam. I realized I knew nothing except caricatures and generalized history.
The first anniversary of 9/11 found me working in a vineyard at my first vendange near Libourne, France at the Chateau Vieux Chevrol. I was the American, the outsider and I was working with a big mix of Dutch, French, Algerians and Moroccans. Most people were pretty curious about me and found my extremely bad french pretty amusing. The Moroccans for the most part were very warm towards me, but there were some Algerians who refused to speak to me and one who was out right hostile when he found out I was an American. A guy named Mustapha, who became my "victim". Because I refused to be his victim. When he spat at my feet, I laughed. When we ate together for lunch, I made a point to sit beside him and jabber away and joke in English and French. After 3 days, the people at the table made sure the seat next to him was waiting for me. I was cutting grapes the first year and I ended up working next to him with a number of other Algerian and Moroccans who joked with me. One afternoon, a woman who had been initially hostile to me, Xenab, asked me if I had seen the World Trade Centers collapse. I tried to tell them eyewitness account as well as I could, but I tried to explain that it made me want to learn about the rest of the world. It made want to reach out, rather than shrink away.
The next day, at lunch, I had an epiphany as Mustapha suddenly turned to me and told me, "You know, I can speak english very well." In fact, his english was better than his french. He was actually a very interesting intelligent and surprisingly cultured person. We were suddenly buddies. I had another friend that year. A Russian named Sergei, who spoke much better english than french. I found myself translating for him.
Now I work with the same group of Moroccans each year. I eat dinner at their homes. We can tell each other jokes and laugh. I have seen their kids grow up. Xeneb gives me Moroccan treats. I find myself understanding their religion more and more. I see the variations in the sects.
What is the point of this? I spent a lot of time learning the geopolitical forces that created the impetus for the Al Qaeda attack on New York. My anger is not wasted on an entire group of people, but finely focused on the real culprits. In fact, I have learned to appreciate the culture and the art of a large portion of the world that was shrouded in a self imposed veil of ignorance.
My advice? America, stop reliving the pain. Let the festering wound heal. Stop the infection of Racist hate, because you are only making yourself sicker. Much worse things have happened to people everywhere on the planet all through history and life goes on, relentlessly. Learn to Laugh at Yourselves Again.
So, the night after the World Trade Center Attack, there was a Friars Club Roast in Manhattan for Hugh Hefner. The room was dead. Nobody had the mojo. Nobody was laughing. Then the comedian Gilbert Gottfried came on and dared to tell a few jokes that mentioned the disaster...stunned silence...so then Gilbert launches into his version of the now legendary "Aristocrats" routine. The most utterly tasteless, long, purposely relentless obscene joke in the history of show business. You haven't heard it? Gottfrieds rendition of the joke became so legendary that an entire movie was made about other comedians telling their version of the joke. When he finished, the room exploded. It was an utterly cathartic moment. If you want, I'll post one of Gottfrieds renditions of the joke...every time he tells it, it's different. But here's Gottfriend trying to explain why he can't show the video of the actual performance....

worD septemBer 6, 2011

“Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.”Aristotle

GOP FANTASYLAND!

The Republican Party is proud to announce the grand opening of it's new theme park!

 GOP FANTASYLAND!

A magic place where everyone who wants to pay to play can imagine living in the greatest gated community on earth! A place where you can cross the drawbridge into the magic kingdom, tear up the social contract and leave it burning behind you!

A place where you can imagine that someday perhaps. you might be rich enough to deserve to vote! A magic place where everyone can get a job...perhaps not the job you want, but heck, who needs a minimum wage as long as your wealthy neighbor will hire you to mow the lawn and live in a trailer out in the back as the price to live free or die...Because that's Free Enterprise and what made America Great!

It's all part of the GOP FantasyLand experience!

But this is the brilliance of the Conservatives at this point in time in America. They understand that it is not the message, but how it is communicated. We are a nation with a short attention span. We are a nation that doesn't like big words or complicated concepts. The Republicans understand language.

The Democrats ceded the field. Above all, they do not understand language. Their initiatives are posed in impenetrable policy-speak: the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The what? - can anyone even remember it? No wonder the pejorative "Obamacare" won out. Contrast that with the Republicans' Patriot Act. You're a patriot, aren't you? Does anyone at the GED level have a clue what a Stimulus Bill is supposed to be? Why didn't the White House call it the Jobs Bill and keep pounding on that theme?

You know that Social Security and Medicare are in jeopardy when even Democrats refer to them as entitlements. "Entitlement" has a negative sound in colloquial English: somebody who is "entitled" selfishly claims something he doesn't really deserve. Why not call them "earned benefits," which is what they are because we all contribute payroll taxes to fund them? That would never occur to the Democrats. Republicans don't make that mistake; they are relentlessly on message: it is never the "estate tax," it is the "death tax."

Of course the down side for the Republicans is that in constructing their GOP FANTASYLAND, they created the TEABAGGER CHAINSAW MASSACRE THRILL RIDE as a very special attraction and it seems to have run amok.

garr, this looks like lots of fun, but look at that damn line!
YEEHAHHHH!

Breath

Dave Thomas and Pere Ubu live from 1988. Thomas was one of the greatest rock vocalists ever.

He is pure surreal performance art.

evolution

this is a joke, right?

Sarkozy versus Gypsies

On Thursday,  a gypsy camp was brutally broken up by the French Police, families were separated and RER commuter trains were requisitioned to hastily begin illegal deportations with out due legal process.

More of this governments pandering to the extreme right element they think they need to win the next presidential election, but also, echoing the racist brutality that is surfacing across Europe.

The Gypsy Band, VAMA with the rapper Ralflo.

Play this loud and watch on a full screen, please!

Here's a translation of the French Rap segment:

 (France smells like a bad aroma

It's like a riot along the runways

They are crushing, demolishing the vivid dreams of the romantics 

Remove their serums from all caravans

Cash, 3 shooters and we throw up the rum

The Rom(a) sent away, guts by airmail 

This Romeo lands in Romania

Juliet is a man, she banished him

Abolished borders as Ebola did

Definition of Roma, the real, modified

Superman, consensus, all abide

One could write thousands of novels about

We are all sons of gypsies, nomads, migrants

Sarkozy continues to do a lot

But still all roads lead to the Rom(a).)

The Devils Cigar

Mount Etna is now erupting in Italy, spewing hot lava everywhere. Back in 2000, Etna was much calmer. She spent her days chilling out, blowing pretty smoke rings, which is apparently is a extremely rare occurrence for volcanoes.

So strange, in fact, that only three have been documented: Two from Etna in 1970 and 2000, and another from Eyjafjallajokull in Iceland, in May 2010. I like to think the Devil is sitting inside, having some brandy and a cigar. Check out this video of the phenomena from Mt. Etna in 2000.

Defender Of The Constitution

In spite of his statements in the past that Texas might be better off if it seceded from the United States, The Texan Republican Governor and officially declared presidential candiate, Rick Perry claims to be a real patriotic American and defender of the constitution.
He is all for a constitution that includes a line-item veto for the president or prohibits protective tariffs (free trade!). Or rejects Henry Clay-style federal financing of internal improvements (no stimulus!).

That's Rick Perry’s understanding of the Constitution, but it seems to be a whole lot closer to the Confederate Constitution that it is to anything resembling the Constitution of the United States:

Social Security and Medicare. Rick Perry thinks that Medicare and Social Security are unconstitutional, but America’s Constitution empowers our nation to “lay and collect taxes . . . and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States” — a power which unambiguously enables it to enact essential programs such as Social Security and Medicare. The Confederate Constitution only permitted its congress to “lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises for revenue, necessary to pay the debts, provide for the common defense, and carry on the Government of the Confederate States.” Without the power to “provide for the general welfare,” Medicare and Social Security would be unconstitutional in the Confederacy.

Infrastructure: The U.S. Constitution permits elected officials to build bridges, schools and other internal projects within a state. The Confederate Constitution, however, forbids its congress from “appropriat[ing] money for any internal improvement intended to facilitate commerce.” Such a ban would not only eliminate earmarks, which Perry falsely claims are “an unconstitutional perversion” on page 64 of his book Fed Up!, it would also have forbidden much in the way of economic stimulus — something Perry vehemently opposes.

Presidential Power: In 2006, Perry called for expanding President Bush’s power by granting him a line-item veto enabling him to unilaterally alter federal appropriations. Line-item vetos are unconstitutional under the U.S. Constitution, but the Confederate Constitution provides that the President may “approve any appropriation and disapprove any other appropriation in the same bill.” 
In other words, you can now cast away any lingering doubts you might have had about Rick Perry.

What would America be like under a Rick Perry presidency? Well, if Rick Perry’s Texas is any indication, the country could look forward to 85 mph speed limits, hog hunting from helicopters and a security check “fast-lane” for concealed handgun carriers.

Any minor concerns you might have had about casting a vote for a man who…

drastically cut eduction funding as governor

is not quite sure about that evolution thing which know-nothing scientists keep talking about

believes climate scientists are in it for the money

prays for rain

thinks Medicare is unconstitutional

wants federal income tax scrapped

would work to make abortion illegal in all 50 states

would gives states the right to opt out of Social Security and Medicaid

prays for an end to EPA regulations

wants same-sex marriage made unconstitutional by redrafting the Constitution

So what? On Thursday, in Texas,the ‘pork chopper’ law came into effect !  That’s right, for $500 Texans can now shoot  an unlimited number of 400 pound hogs with semi-automatic rifles from low flying helicopters.  Nice.

I think it’s a fair trade-off.  You get a loud mouth, in your face religious, gay-hating, science-bashing, shit-for-brains president in exchange for the right to shoot animals from helicopters in all 50 states.  It doesn’t get much better than that.  And you can consider those security check fast-lanes for concealed handgun carriers as a bonus gift from President Perry.

In other words, there seems to be a pretty good explanation for why Perry recently published Fed Up!, an anti-government manifesto claiming that pretty much everything that protects ordinary Americans’ ability to live fruitful and productive lives is unconstitutional. He must have been working off the wrong constitution.

"I wouldn't have written this book if I was going to run for president
of The United States"

Kawfee Jerks

This is wayyy funnier if you replace the word "coffee" with "feminine odor".

No, wait.....This is wayyy funnier if you replace all of the women's apologetic statements with, "go fuck yourself and make your own coffee you sexist pig."

But, why don't we let Steve Martin show us the right way to make Kawfeee!

Je vais pisser ici!

Les Gaulois dans l'espace par EdouardBaer

Last week, Gerard Depadieu scandalized the passengers on a Paris/Dublin flight by drunkenly pissing in the aisle when the restroom was occupied in his urgence.

Depardieu chose to parody himself as he reprises his portrayal of the character Obelix the Gaulois in this little piece, Gaulois In Space!

The door's open, c'mon in, make yourself "comfy"
can I get you a drink?

You Need Satan More Than He Needs You!

My soundtrack for the Religious Right in America for their next dance party!

The film is an extract from the Swedish 1922 film, HAXAN that was used by the brilliant Welsh band, The Future Of The Left, as a backdrop for their performance at the 

Leeds Festival in 2009.

Point Of View

When beginning to discuss religion and it's role in American politics, we have to define our views on religion and how religion evolved into what it is in relationship to the development of our consciousness and how it is affected by the environment it evolved in. All major religions are the outgrowth of the developmental stages of human intelligence.  To begin, I would like to divide the concept of religious experience into two categories: 

Religions of hardship and religions of plenty.

Western religion is one of hardship of the harsh desert climate, Eastern religion is one of abundance of lush forests and valleys.

Take this painting Christ in the Desert (above) depicting Christ in the desert. It is clear that such an arid climate, where a day not looking for food or water is a risk for your life (see human life in deserts), will lead to a religion that is unforgiving. The western religions that developed in the middle eastern deserts, christianity, judaism and islam are tribal, harsh, dogmatic, inflexibly authoritarian. The dogma of each religion has been kept from the questioning intellects of the subjects. For centuries, the christian bible was not accessible to the common man. Either you obey or are damned.

Eastern religion developed in the land of plenty, so its religions are much less geared towards punishment. The Garden of Eden was a land of plenty, as depicted here in The Fall of Man by Lucas Cranach.

But, Eastern religions, like buddhism, are open ended, adaptable. The symbols represent concepts for transcendence. They are tools to give one the ability to focus the truth with in us all.  The image above, of the traditional Hindu god, Ganeesh has transcended the concept of Hindu ism. Ganeesh is everywhere through out the east in many forms. It isn't the deity, Ganeesh that is worshipped, it is the concept that Ganeesh represents. Ganeesh has managed to insunuate his happy vibe into the many forms of buddhism, throughout much of the world. Ganeesh becomes a focus of meditation, the ceremonies are a gateway into the inner mind. The vibe of Ganeesh becomes a way of channeling energy and thoughts in a very positive way. Positive thoughts and meditation translate into positive attitude and action. Meditation is more of a scientific, therapeutic technique for self exploration. Zen is a blissful experience of the concept of nothingness. In Western theology, eternity is the sword which is used to exact subjugation, in Eastern religion, eternity is a concept of release, ultimate freedom.

Repressive Puritanism or  Enlightened Zen? Is that a question? 

wORd SepTember 1, 2011

"No one is free, even the birds are chained to the sky"
Bob Dylan

A hurricane named Irene, or the golden ratio strikes again