I have nothing to say about the New Orleans disaster and the outrageous Federal non-response that hasn't already been said. I tried watching the cable news on one of the evenings when the levees were just starting to break, but I found most of the anchors disgusting and their overwhelming excitement about "looters" to be poisonous.
So I started to get all my information from the blogosphere, as it's called, and the best place, bar none, from day one of the hurricane has been a blog called AMERICAblog: Because America Deserves The Truth! It's run by a writer/policy wonk out of Washington, D.C. named John Avarosis, a young, gay Greek-American originally from Chicago who has worked as a policy consultant for Madeline Albright, among other people.
He's been writing "Where the hell is George?" from day one of the hurricane, and posting more pertinent information than you can imagine. The only drawback with his site is that it's gotten TOO popular and the once-fascinating "Comments" sections underneath each of his posts have gotten too full and too dull. Click here to get to the site.
I'm a little reluctant to recommend the above site, "Rigorous Intuition," because frankly it's so terrifying. Written by a "cautiously pessimistic Canadian novelist and satirist" named Jeff Wells, the brilliant site is pretty much conspiracy theory central except that it's written with such low-key, classically Canadian restraint that you can forget that he's writing about George Bush Senior as a pedophile with satanic connections and then offering fairly rigorous proof of this little historical byway. Here's the first three paragraphs of his latest rumination on New Orleans:
I don't know what hurts more, my heart or my head.
How is it that one of America's great cities ceased to exist this week, but I can still watch Letterman tonight?
What do I do with this knowledge: there are more than a million internal refugees and estimates of 100,000 dead, and yet the Pentagon is "hurt" that the media is siding more with victims than federal authorities?
Read this site with great care. Though it's also getting a bit too popular, most of the commenters heed Mr. Wells' civilized style and write about outrageous things without getting too ugly and/or crazy. In fact, one of my favorite takes on the payback the Bush Cabal can be expecting was written by someone named "starroute":
The deaths of the innocent don't necessarily work to the advantage of their executioners.
I posted something the other day at the ezboard (though the last I looked, nobody had commented on it), suggesting that the the spiritual power of all the soldiers who have died in Iraq is being channeled through Cindy Sheehan -- and that this is what the magical/symbolic arm-wrestling over the field of crosses has been about.
The ghosts of New Orleans are notoriously uncontrollable. I see no reason why Bush/Cheney should expect to get any real advantage out of them.
Click here to get to this amazing, paranoid site that unfortunately makes as much sense as anything else right now.
In front of the Main Civic Center branch of the San Francisco Public Library today, there was a used book sale in progress.
For future reference, it happens from 11AM to 2PM on the first Friday of every month from April to October, meaning next month will be the last one this year.
It is put on by Friends of the Public Library...
...a group that is regularly vilified at the beginning of the public comments section at each Board of Supervisors meeting.
The guy going after them is tall, appears to be in his 60s, and is astonishingly articulate, but once you've seen him enough times on Channel 26, you realize he's a monomaniac.
The next big event for "The Friends" will be their annual monster used book sale at Fort Mason, a famous event that has always sounded a bit like the city of Boston's department store, Filene's, with its famous basement where women were known to tear clothing out of each other's arms in order to get the best bargain.
This event, which I just happened to stumble across, was petite and charming.
The best part was watching the book lovers just sitting down on the concrete...
...and perusing their possible purchases.
The prices, by the way, were $1 for a hardback, $.50 for a paperback which is essentially giving them away.
Most of the stuff they were selling was junk, though I was tempted to buy "How To Get Pregnant" just because I liked the title.
Still, there were a few treasures among the dross, and there were quite a few different sections from cookbooks to sci-fi...
...along with fiction and broken-up sets of classics.
The most interesting section actually looked like the three boxes full of comic books, or "graphic novels" as they were calling them. I asked the blonde French boy who was avidly going through the stacks whether he'd seen any Asterix and he quickly told me no, but gave me a big smile because I'd even heard of Asterix. (Thanks, Ellen and Pedro.)
I did manage to snag a treasure, a hardback copy of Italy's great classic historical novel, "I Promessi Sposi" or "The Betrothed" as it's called in English. Written in the 1820's by Alessandro Manzoni, for whom Verdi eventually wrote his requiem, it's a 600-page historical novel about Milan and environs during the year 1630, which ends with the plague hitting the city and the population going from 240,000 to 80,000 in six months.
I read the book in the early 1980s, when AIDS first appeared on the scene. I had asked my well-read friend Jerry Morgan whether there was a good book about The Plague. "I Promessi Sposi," he said without hesitation, and he was right. The book is above all an Age of Englightenment look at a very insane period, with Bread Riots in Milan, Crazy Convents, Evil Local Dukes, and finally for the last third of the tale, The Plague. Its hero and heroine are a peasant couple who are "betrothed" at the beginning of the book and are thwarted in their plans to get married every step of the way while taking in just about every misadventure of their times. If you're ever feeling ambitious about reading a classic, I can't recommend it highly enough.
Then I checked my email and found an idiotic and insulting note from my Congresswoman, Nancy Pelosi, on "How to Help the Hurricane Victims" in New Orleans. For some reason, this so infuriated me that I wrote her a truly nasty note back, which is below if you're in the mood for a rant.
Dear Congresswoman Pelosi:
Your "How to Help Hurricane Victims" email was both stupid and insulting.You don't even mention the fact that the levees weren't being maintained under YOUR watch, lady, as Minority Speaker, and you don't even mention the disgusting federal aftermath with its nonexistent help for the residents of New Orleans. Instead, you crow about how Dennis Hastert (who has already said New Orleans shouldn't be rebuilt) and yourself are being wonderfully "bipartisan."
And if you weren't such an enabling, goddamned idiot, you might know that one of the people you want us to send "Cash Donations" to is "Operation Blessing," a wing of Pat Robertson's empire. You remember Pat, don't you? The guy who is calling for the assassination of foreign leaders in public?
I don't think you have any idea of the depth of anger in this country right now towards ALL of you in the federal government at this moment. Frankly, I think it's time to toss out all incumbents, including you, and I will be doing my very best to make that a reality.
With Contempt,
Your Constituent
Michael Strickland
6 comments:
Holy cow...a city that goes from 240,000 to 80,000 in six months?
Jeez. It's a good reminder. For a lot of us, these are the good old days...
Booooooooks! (drool) ;-)
Dear SFMIKE,
I am the tall guy who goes to the Supes meetings. I will be 59 later this month. I appreciate your comments and thanks for the compliment, but "amazingly articulate" and "monomaniac" must be somewhat of a contradiction. I am sorry if I may seem monomaniacal, but I would contend it is inherent in the context. They only give you two minutes and laying out the foundation for a point and then making the point is naturally constrained. With even three minutes one can compare and contrast or make an analogy, but coming across as barely articulate when you only have two minutes is a challenge. As you can probably imagine, I have done a good deal of thinking about how it looks to be outside of the City Hall political axis and attempt to use a public forum to make a point. We live in a capitalist system and consequently we all have some prejudgments about people who are not getting paid for what they do. The real question is, How can people who are less articulate than myself get to be heard? Shouldn't we give people who make public comment the benefit of the doubt? What I am attempting to address is the increasing privatization and commercialization of our society. Is there any way to overcome the inherent advantages that privatization and commercialism has? There are some areas in which repetition is considered an advantage. How would you make the point? James,
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Visualization is a tool that has been used for thousands of years by initiates of all the metaphysical schools. Today, it is incorporated into top athlete's daily routines and is used in business affairs frequently. It's use is wide-spread among highly successful people, either consciously or unconsciously, aware of its create power. So if it has stood the test of time and is still being used by high achievers we must come to the conclusion that it works! But has it ever worked for you?
If you answered 'yes' to the above question then you know how powerful this technique can be. If, on the other hand, you gave the more likely answer 'no' then take heart for I am about to reveal to you a sure fire way of reaching your objectives through this mostly misunderstood art.
The trouble with visualization is simple - its in its name!
When studying and contemplating the art of visualization most people have the impression that they must create visual images and make them real or life-like. Many people, in fact the majority, find this almost impossible to do. Even if they can formulate a solid picture of their objective they find it extremely difficult to sustain the image for any length of time. Either the image fades, changes or other intruding thoughts intervene.
This type of visualization is almost impossible to sustain and luckily it is not at all necessary. Why? Because it is in the subconscious mind that your visualization needs to be placed and there is good news. The subconscious mind does not know the difference between an imaginary event and a real one. Your visual image only needs to be a strong visually as any other imagined event. However, that is only half the story.
If all you had to do was just imagine stuff and your world automatically changed to reflect your imaginings this world would be full of chaos (not to mention all those creepy crawly bug-eyed monsters!). Therefore, there are a few more steps to complete before the visualization is passed to the subconscious for manifestation.
Let's try a little experiment. Remember a scene from your past that has a lot of good feelings around it. Any good memory will do, like the first time you heard the words "I love you" from your partner, an amazingly spectacular sunset, a great holiday event or your last birthday. Pick one and remember it. How clear is the image? Can you remember any sounds? What way did you feel? Is there any sense of touch, taste or smell? Identify how your memory works. Is it mostly visual, auditory, kinaesthetic or of a feeling nature?
Now we are going to create an imagined event in our lives that has the same strength and potency as that image. So relax and let's go.
Imagine something that you do everyday, something that you did yesterday, today and will do tomorrow. Let us take the example of waking up tomorrow morning. Don't try to add or take anything away, just think about it and analyse the scene. Is it dark or light? Are you lying next to someone in bed? Do you still feel tired? Has the alarm clock sounded? Are you irritable that you have to get up or full of joy at the dawn of a new day?
You will find that the imagined event is very similar to the memory with probably one key difference - your point of perspective. Is the memory behind you and the future event in front of you? Is one to the left and one to the right? Maybe they are both in front of you or the future seems to move in a clockwise direction. Whatever the perspective the thing to notice is that they are very similar in appearance.
Now imagine doing your future event a week from now, then a month from now, then six months from now. Where are those images placed? Are they moving further away, going clockwise, from left to right? This is your time-line and using it is important in visualization as you will see later.
Ok, let's imagine something that is very unlikely to happen and see where it differs from the last image.
Imagine you are sitting somewhere familiar which is extremely comfortable and relaxing to you. Now imagine that a person you know well comes up to where you are and says "hello". Imagine them telling you that they want to show you a new trick. All of a sudden they have three juggling balls. They throw them in the air and begin to juggle with ease. Then they begin to whistle one of your favourite tunes. You suddenly realize that there is a strong smell of flowers in the room and notice a vase of them just behind the juggler. Imagine laughing loudly at the scene and feeling joyful at the experience. Then the person juggling leans forward stands on leg and puts the other leg outstretched behind them. All the while still juggling and whistling. Then they begin to hop on their leg as a small bird flies over to perch on their head. Once you have the imagined event and stayed with it a few moments just let it fade.
Ok open your eyes. What was the difference between the two images? Can you spot any? Did you use more, less or roughly the same senses in your fantasy event as you did in the future one? Did you see them from different angles? Was the picture bigger in one than the other? Was the sound clearer, the feelings more acute or the smell stronger? Take some time and go back to each scene in your mind. How does the future event differ from the fantasy one? Are you looking at both from a different vantage point? Do you see yourself in the image of one but not the other? Analyse the scenes and see where they differ.
Have you identified how the future event differs from the fantasy one? If you have then its time to make visualization work for you! Take a goal that you have been working on or would like to achieve. Nothing too far-fetched at this point please! Pick something that is possible but at the moment seems a little impractical. Once you have it form a mental image of what it would be like to have, be or do that thing or be in that experience. Remember to form it the same way you do a memory. Give it the same strength visually, in sound, feeling, taste and touch - use your mind in its natural state. All you have to do is imagine the scene.
Ok how does it differ from the scene of waking in the morning? Can you identify the differences in perspective, sound, taste, touch, feelings and what you hear?
Now there will be one other key thing that differs in the images- it is very simple but often overlooked. You know that the future event is going to happen! This is reflected in the way we experience the image. So what we are going to do is fool your subconscious mind into thinking your goal is definitely going to happen by manipulating your goal image!
Once you know what the differences are in each image begin to change the goal image so that it is seen the same way as the future event in your imagination. Place the visualized scene in exactly the same position with the same perspective as your future event.
Place it in the correct position on your time-line. You may already begin to feel that the goal is more possible. Visualise in this way everyday and you will condition your subconscious mind to manifest the experiences necessary to make your goal attainment certain.
One more thing to remember: During the day think about your goal often. This reinforces the visualization and will begin to dispel doubt from your mind. personal-development.info
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