Tuesday, November 8, 2016

Where is the love?

Watching "news" (more commentary than news, some blatantly fictional and biased) while I was outside the USA regarding the 2016 elections, a curious phenomenon became obvious.

Four main camps were vying for the presidency, 1-Hillary and 2-Bernie for the Democrats and 3-Trump and 4-the rest of the Republican field (not to mention Green Party and Libertarian Party candidates). "News" and events were covered differently depending on source and candidate implicitly (and often explicitly) supported by the given media source. That is, although covering similar stories and events, different media outlets were slanting the same stories and events differently depending on the candidate they wanted favored.

That said, once whittled down to two main candidates, then the influential mainstream media, from anecdotal observation, began to exhibit a scheming, lopsided bias rather than holding to journalistic virtues of truth seeking and reporting of facts over commentating with subjective analysis. Along those lines, also, entirely lopsided was the highly influential tech and social media giants of our day with an impact on virtually every aspect of the average person's online life and beyond, i.e., Google (who regularly visits the White House behind closed doors), Microsoft, Twitter, Facebook and many others chose the same side and worked behind the scenes to bolster that candidate, even though that candidate seemed to have unfairly been anointed to ascend through that side's primaries.

That is, these media giants went all-in for one side, actually for one particular candidate including mainstream outlets in print, on air and online, along with the aforementioned tech giants--a massively influential combination. This subjective support was tremendously persuading, especially versus alternate media which receives lesser viewership and is often dismissed out of hand if reports don't match a reality narrative painted by the bigger, more influential players--not to mention the social brownie points available to anyone voicing support for one candidate and disgust at the other candidate...virtue signalling to gain social merit.

Given the above landscape, nearly everyone is aware of and acknowledges Donald J. Trump's sins, especially aware of them are his supporters. His supporters do not deny or duck them, and some are very serious flaws that are obviously alarming.
On the other hand, it seems that Hillary supporters are not similarly aware of their own candidate's serious transgressions. Some supporters dismiss them as unfair attacks that are partisan or simply within the bell curve of an average politician's misdemeanors and peccadilloes. By an large, most of her supporters are not aware of allegations or do not pay much if any attention to them.

That is, from my observation and because of collusion by the aforementioned mainstream forces, supporters seem by and large to be unaware of her dangers and sins and not only that, they do not entertain wider consideration of serious flaws at all and take umbrage when brought up, again unlike the other side which actually seems to acknowledge if not accept their own candidate's failings.

Here is an example from the current Pope, a Catholic figurehead who might be understandably expected to be concerned with spirituality above all other matters and expected to perhaps disregard politics altogether. Well, he cannot seem to separate the two and peculiarly seems to be most interested in politics above all else.

If he truly is overly interested enough to venture outside his ken of religion and dabble in political commentary, at least enough to comment seriously the wide world, then would he then care enough to be as informed as possible? It begs the question, how does this Pope avail himself of information and stay current with news and events? In many cases, he seems to have bought into mainstream portrayals of the candidates and depictions of current events particularly in the Middle East and reacts to them with politically-charged pronouncements laced with opinions that, because of his status, are voiced through a worldwide megaphone to an enormous audience of Catholics and beyond--terribly influential to the average gentile.

Regarding the US elections, he seems to be unaware of major flaws leveled against one of the candidates while blowing the other's out of proportion. Does he realize the enormity and depth of the allegations that he is overlooking on one side....potential flaws that many cannot abide by in any person who would have great national and global powers. Perhaps, like with many Hillary supporters, his lack of awareness is understandable given that major tech and media players including social media  (e.g., Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Twitter and beyond) are modifying algorithms and censoring "news", events and stories to slant things and to shadow block others according to their worldview (a worldview largely underwritten by Millennial ideals with a youthful bedrock of staff whose ideas tend toward socialism including limitations on free speech among other anti-democratic positions) while serving up side-dishes of fiction along the way.

Here is the link to a recent story regarding the Pope in America, The National Catholic Review, Days Before The US Election Pope Francis Warns Against Politics of Fear http://www.americamagazine.org/content/dispatches/days-us-election-pope-francis-warns-against-politics-fear 

The following is my response to this article:

How does the world's first Jesuit Pope stay informed enough to proclaim that love is the missing, miracle ingredient in the world today including the US Presidential election? Where is this love...and is it perhaps hidden behind his own judgmental policies and somewhat superficial understanding of issues that he may not wholly understand?

-Does Mr. Bergoglio (Pope Francis) realize that Hillary proclaimed "We came, we saw, he DIED (chuckle)" after spearheading a military assault that saw relatively liberal Qaddafi murdered and Libya subsequently devolved to chaos and fallen to ruins as a failed state with deathly suffering to millions since (was HRC leading with love then...or are we supposed to believe that she has changed on no tangible evidence whatsoever...has she really dramatically changed and will miraculously lead with love if elected...except maybe when it comes to Russia...or another Libya and who knows whcih others? #NeoChickenHawk

-Is this politically active Pope aware that The Drone President dropped 23,144 BOMBS in 2015 and this Nobel Prizewinner Warmonger is on record saying, "I'm really good at KILLING people"? Whiskey Tango Foxtrot--who says something like that, especially alarming when it is the Commander-in-Chief of the world's mightiest military, a person who can back it up?
-Who in their right mind says something like that regardless of context, especially one of the world's leading statesmen? Where is the love, Pope? Obama? Maybe it is time for the Pope to avail himself of the reality that Obama has been the first US President at war for a full two terms in office. Can any Americans name the seven countries that he has been bombing in their names?! It's horrific to be a voiceless citizen against this wake of death and destruction wrought by our leaders without proper explanation and with scant knowledge by fellow citizens who can do nothing about it.
If the Pope looks closer then he might find that one of the candidates has at least voiced opposition to the lethal collusion between Big War...Big Gov and Military Industrial Psychosis of Profiteering Warmongers and venereal relations between BigCorp/BigBanks/BigPharma/CorpMedia and so on.

-Does Pope Francis realize that HRC voted in favor of war in Iraq... part of a warring resume as an 'experienced' candidate (even though she didn't know better than to vote against a violent, humanitarian tragedy in the first place) and will she now suddenly and miraculously lead with love having learned from the deaths of others or perhaps continue lethal, ignorant neo-chickenhawk ways of Bush, Rumsfeld, Rice, Cheney, Obama and her own warring record as Secretary of State in collusion with arms manufacturers and crony socialists?

-Does this Pope even know upon whom (which countries and peoples) the many lethal bombs have been dropped these last eight years, tragically including innocent victims who've been physically scarred and handicapped if not killed outright while enduring the Neo Chicken Hawks lethal schemes of misguided, deathly "nation building"?
It brings to mind Thomas Paine's exhortation against aggressive warfare, "Not all the treasures of the world, so far as I believe, could have induced me to support an offensive war, for I think it murder."
Regardless of this ghastly, unending tragedy of war on earth, the Pope now supports a proven militaristic candidate who has helped ignite wars and foment a refugee crisis while he also admonishes countries for not bringing more and more of the refugees from countries the recipient themselves are at war with...isn't that a dangerous mix for all involved including both refugees and recipients--i.e., letting in streams of refugees from countries with which you are waging war?! Wouldn't localized safe zones along with assisting refugees to neighboring countries be a more humanitarian solution that would be much more reasonable and viable for all as lifestyles and beliefs within regions are generally more easy to transition into for both immigrants and recipients?

-And dear Pope, when were such high walls constructed around Vatican City and whom were they meant to keep out (hint: think fanatical invaders...maybe the walls were built at that time with love for the safety of cherished people inside, protected by such walls)?

-How many refugees has the Vatican itself accepted so far or does the Pope delight in hypocrisy, too, with a 'do as I say, not as I do' attitude? "First remove the beam out of your own eye, and then you can see clearly to remove the speck out of your brother's eye." Matthew 7:5, Christian Bible
Or, he simply doesn't allow strangers into a strange land, unknown people into Vatican City and doesn't allow this not out of hate for strangers but out of perhaps love, welfare and safety of his loved ones already therein...and wouldn't these strangers from distant lands be much better off in a land more similar to their homeland cultures, beliefs and lifestyles?

-Meanwhile...does the Pope know which country has been the largest supplier of worldwide arms for the same decades that HRC has been politically active and voting on such weapon supply chains and working with the US Military Industrial Pyschotic Complex? Unfortunately, not much love there it seems anyway you look at it.
Is HRC concerned only with grandstanding about gun violence within the USA while the USA exports arms all over the globe? And isn't she surrounded by guns...her bodyguards and security team...she wants others to give up guns while she herself enjoys the protection they provide?

-Can Mr. Bergoglio at least acknowledge that the worst 'mortocracies' of the 20th century align on the same left that he paradoxically believes is more loving than the right (countless deaths wrought by leftist regimes such as Maoist China, Soviet Russia, North Korea, Cambodia...even murderous WWII Germany was led by a socialist party....would this papal love have stopped any of them or does this love need to be tempered with wisdom and have a strong foundation of common sense and right action to be viable and effective and not just a belief that the giver of love is in the right?

-Does it bother the Pope that many US citizens are very concerned that the US Department of Justice might have become politicized and that the Obama administration has punished more whistle-blowers and journalists than other administrations...except HRC seems to be above these aggressively enforced laws altogether, laws that have been used to punish others severely for far lesser violations....
E.g,, No prosecution for transmitting classified information knowingly or otherwise, and although caught sending and receiving classified messages on unsecured systems, no one within her cadre was held accountable. Although destroying government evidence and property after subpoenas were issued (destroyed not by 'wiping with a cloth (chuckle and a wink)' but knowingly by using high level technological techniques such as Bleach Bit as well as brute force such as hammers with the specific intent to evade capture and prosecution). No one was prosecuted and even more curious, five people were given immunity...strange indeed as normally immunity is granted solely to move prosecution of bigger fish forward...that certainly did not happen so why the grant of immunity in the first place?

-The US now has an Attorney General who has taken the fifth amendment (that is, she declined to answer question to avoid self-incrimination)...yes, this is the Attorney General of the USA, supposedly a role-model of law and justice for the rest of the country...taking the fifth to avoid self-incrimination.

Does this information and much more pass by the Pope and leave nothing save a whiff of the essence of blissful ignorance?

-The Democratic National Committee has gone through three directors because of abuse of power in favoring HRC as well as collusion with the Clinton campaign..."The Most Interesting Man in Vermont" Sanders had to face more than votes to win and therefore lost. Yes, given the behind the scenes scheming, it is no wonder he lost despite widespread popular support--exemplified by political rallies that dwarfed Clinton's in number and enthusiasm.

The above is a small sample off the top of my head of seemingly bottomless evidence against one particular candidate. Yet again, this and more seem to have passed right by the Pope leaving no impression other than perhaps an ephemeral scent of blissful ignorance as it evaporated before reaching his political consciousness.

Dear Pope, unless you believe that the above is part of a vast conspiracy and perhaps wholly untrue, then please seek greater understandings of complex issues before stepping deeper into politics. Without searching for greater truth and thereby, then the Pope will be obfuscating issues for those of us who truly hope and pray that Love and Peace will win and reign after decades upon decades of ignorance and self-serving madness.

"The best road to progress is freedom's road." -John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States of America





Thursday, November 3, 2016

Handicrafts for the world...

...umm, in my humble reckoning, people in (so-called) developing economies do not really want to be making handicrafts for the relatively wealthy of the rest of the world...

“Aid undermines what poor people need most: an effective government."
-Angus Deaton, Nobel Prizewinner in Economic Sciences 2015

"The best road to progress is freedom's road." 
-John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States of America

"The most important factor in lifting people out of poverty is allowing free markets and entrepreneurship to flourish."
-William Easterly, Ph.D., New York University Professor of Economics

Sunday, October 30, 2016

Aid agents, are you listening?

“Aid undermines what poor people need most: an effective government that works with them for today and tomorrow."
-Angus Deaton, Nobel Prizewinner in Economic Sciences 2015

“The problem of poverty is not a shortage of experts. It’s a shortage of rights...the most important factor in lifting people out of poverty is allowing free markets and entrepreneurship to flourish...when there's an environment of universal rights for poor people, for citizens of a society, then that does indeed make technical solutions happen."
-William Easterly, Ph.D., New York University Professor of Economics

"The best road to progress is freedom's road." 

-John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States of America

"Let my people go!"
-Dambisa Moyo, Ph.D., Economist and Author of 
Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way


Aid agents, are you listening to the above experts?

For more reading on this Himalayan subject, please follow this link,

Friday, September 9, 2016

Aiding and abetting immoral leaders?

Progress and development come through transparent governance and open markets underpinned by liberal democracy -- not an elitist ruling class dictating to the people.

Casteism is simply a euphemism for apartheid and alive and robust despite upper castes claiming that it has been ameliorated....while controlling the government, military, media, police, health and education, 
bureaucracy and so on...

The situation in India (
India’s government is now shaming people into using toilets by Rama Lakshmi The Washington Post, 08 Sept 16) is similar to Nepal's Lost Horizon

Photo by Alonzo Lyons

More on this topic here,
House of Himalayan Crap
and 

Friday, August 26, 2016

Burning Man's Glitzy BS? (i.e., all that glitters in the desert is not the fabled 'sharing economy')

(The following is a response to Burning Man Turns 30: the Joys, Pitfalls (and Drugs) of Hollywood's "Vacation for the Soul" , published in The Hollywood Reporter, 26 August 2016)



If Burners (Burning Man event participants) and Burning Man event organizers overlook the high price of an entry ticket ($390 to $1200), the mad desert blowout might then possibly be considered a ‘non-commercial’ arena. 

Does it take a special kind of enlightened soul to not see right through the astronomical entry fees? In other words, the event grounds can be legitimately non-commercial only if the event itself is free of cost (after expenses) -- yet, participants and organizers willingly overlook blatant profiteering from the get-go of purchasing a wildly overpriced entry ticket. Thereafter, they pretend to engage in a 'sharing economy' while frolicking with the fruits of the market economy that they bring along with them to erect an imaginary Elysium and play in it.

Can festival ravers possibly imagine that it marvelously appears out of non-commercial thin air including 'a half-million dollar sound-system' on a Playa (nickname of the dusty event grounds) shuttle bus, lavish costumes with nifty sequins and niftier body paint and glitter, camping/desert survival gear, decorated bicycles and requisite swank sunglasses, ice-chests filled with highly processed ‘health foods’ and stylish beverages like coconut water imported on gasoline fumes from halfway around an ailing globe (paradoxically, desert-stormers overlook inconvenient ‘carbon footprints’ in the parched sands for a week of indulgence while holding everyone else accountable the other 51 weeks). From waffles to building materials for temples and other structures erected magnificently where there were none…apparently, the loins of the gods opened up and shed extreme, albeit transient, favor on the sand-bitten spectacleabout as free of cost as it is free of environmental concerns.

Is overlooking ecology concerns and high-finance robbery a hidden charade that keeps Burners from the despair of a lethal cognitive dissonance? Hypocrisy is a pox that is desperately banished by chic flower children of the new millennium and their faddish predecessors from the sixties onward--even when that means burying heady egos deep into the sands of time. Nevertheless, the artifice that there is no cost because, well, you know, those fluffy waffles taste ‘super amazing!’ and the ‘super awesome!’ Elvis lookalike chefs gave them out liberally to all who showed up in (mandatory) hipster garb after passing through high-dollar entry gates (yep, gates and barriers that anywhere else are a riot-worthy no-no...yes, gates are apparently acceptable when they serve those who reckon them necessary for a diamond-studded bottom line). The gathering Hive Mind is shepherded through by a semi-clothed to buck-nude and perma-smiling "Welcome Home!" posse processing a vehicle lineup of exclusive ticket holders for up to a week's worth of the world's finest groupthink disguised as non-conformity en masse (imagine a week-long, outdoor TED talk inflated by steroids potent psychedelics and spiced up with various degrees of nudity and too-cool-for-school DJs). 




The expenses of carousing the Playa are presumed to be counterbalanced by one’s own 'giveaways'…except perish the thought, any thought of cost-analysis and payback reciprocity -- ledgers do not exist here (of course, organizers and ticket-takers exempted). Moreover, those who do not have anything to contribute are shunned. Yes, at this ephemeral utopia of 'peace and love', those who are presumed to have nothing en vogue to give are ostracized and judged as not worthy of the peacocky affair in the desert (revealing a haughty band of neo-hippies espousing a limited brand of neo-"peace and love"?).

Meanwhile, an extravagant lifestyle with posh campgrounds cum community playground is funded and supplied pre-arrival with pre-purchased, highly processed goods (yes, including goods picked up at so-called 'health food stores'), elitist gear and toys, etcetera — and because the expenses are incurred in distant markets before arrival, they are conveniently forgotten as the group fever for the so-called 'sharing economy' ignites.

If lusty BM colonialists truly want to believe in smarmy non-commercial ideals then dump nearly everything procured beforehand (and hauled in overloaded vehicles from sports utility vehicles to motor homes and even private aircraft). Enjoy nature without the rewards of commercialism, e.g., pricey foods and party enhancements stockpiled before the ‘non-commercial’ jubilee kicks off. 

Despite wishes to make it so, simply calling the event ‘commercial-free’ will not marvelously render Burning Man a 'sharing economy'. Otherwise, to begin to do so, for starters, attendees also might make a pilgrimage to Black Rock City (name of the conurbation that crops up at the event site otherwise known as Black Rock Desert) by self-propulsion (saving pilgrims the despair of using decried petrochemicals in the aforementioned petrol-guzzling vehicles with a massive carbon footprint tread-print or even skyward contrail for the airborne).

How long could this trendy mob of pretentious mother-huggers (and grandmother huggers) then live off the land before starving to death or dying of thirst? Could they gather under a billion stars at night and enjoy music created naturally without electricity, without posh sound systems and without instruments forged through a despised industrialization that they cannot escape no matter how they portray it all as an iconoclastic Promised Land…farcically labeled commercial-free? 

Is it asking too much for the wild-eyed participants to look beyond the molding-board thin façade of a faux social paradise relying on free-market underpinnings? Dare the verboten word capitalism even be uttered-- capitalist underpinnings from transportation to and from airport hubs and on to the venue to keeping Burners well-dined and wined (and fuzzy brained), costumed, comfortable and entertained while there, all with a robust entry-ticket price tag?

If not, then call it an exercise in inconvenient duplicity. Meanwhile, the gala is growing in size and cost while paradoxically its downfall is decried by condescending, ageing Burners (who remarkably resemble current, cookie-cutter Burners -- the article's photo of Katy Perry reveals a swank outfit that could be that of every other female participant at this ironically nonconformist event). The downfall is partly blamed on Photoshop’d Instagram propaganda (and yes, the Amazon Studio exec's photo in the article is obviously enhanced to make it more dreamy despite a herd of sheeple milling in the background -- difficult to recognize chichi Katy Perry in a madding artistic gulag of similarly outfitted renegade nonconformists and professional wannabe hipsters. (Inconvenient irony, too?)

If only Trader Joes', Whole Foods, Wild Oats, Fresh & Easy et al participated in the merrymaking bonanza by supplying factory-processed munchies out of the goodness of their non-commercial hearts…then every hipster could reduce costs significantly and live happily trendy ever after…at least for that week of revelry while supplies held out at this fiery New Age potlatch.


Wednesday, August 17, 2016

Is aid killing Nepal?

The following is in response to Emily Troutman's 
First of all, many cheers to Troutman for the insightful coverage of the outrageous situation in Nepal.

Her piece sadly outlines major mistakes (in some cases willful conniving) of an aid industry motivated by high profits and high salaries with huge outlays of resources—the aid industry swooped in after the quakes and has irreversibly shaken Nepal by their mistakes (on top of decades of indefinite aid that has warped society).

The Nepali people by and large know that they are being conned or rather used while they continue to suffer chronic poverty and marginalization and other ill-effects up to the ultimate cost of death for the unwitting (to give them the benefit of the doubt) crimes of an aid cohort in collusion with a dysfunctional status quo.

The people are not blind to the malfeasance of the government and pampered, high-living, high-salaried aid entrepreneurs creating an aftershock of chaos Nepal. The aid industry and ruling class that they abet are benefiting off the weakened backs of a disenfranchised people who are basically on life-support.

It is astonishing that after a valid critique and pointing out massive complications and dilemmas in the aid industry, Troutman then offers a list of suggestions….namely suggestions for giving a green light to the continued aid boondoggle that she has just revealed. That is, she admits deep troubles (troubles that have caused a prolonged suffering, in some cases lethal suffering, for the people), but rather than shut it down, she suggests moving ahead after the fixes.

As far as I can tell, these suggestions are necessary but not implementable. They would require among other things
a) transparency top to bottom from aid agents on the ground up to the decision makers behind the scenes and all people along a tortuous chain of implementation from ideas to implementation
b) honest, Nepal-savvy aid agents and liaisons
c) trustworthy local counterparts and liaisons
d) omniscient oversight 

Without all of the above elements improbably in place, then intervention will not have a chance to be even remotely successful. In other words, the chances are still quite slim to nil given the difficulty in implementing the above, particularly proper oversight.
   
Even if possible, even under the best case scenario of all of suggestions neatly and cleanly in place (which is a long, long way off from a great proportion of groups trying to effect change in Nepal) aid would have to operate through a dysfunctional status quo to be allowed the permission to attempt to change her---this should be an immediate red flag and show-stopper—that is, going through the very dysfunctional status quo underlying the problems means that aid will itself be distorted no matter how well-intentioned it might be.

Perhaps this is the main concern and take away point that can neither be overlooked nor escaped while operating under a dysfunctional system: aid operates through the governing system no matter how dysfunctional and illegitimate.

That is, by working with and going through a dysfunctional system in order to be given permission to be operational, the aid industry takes an inescapable and unacceptable risk of being part and parcel of the very system causing the problems. Thereby the aid industry becomes associated with those prolonging a deathly suffering as they necessarily abet and collude with  (knowingly and most often unknowingly) the dysfunctional system that allows them to operate in Nepal.

As 2015 Nobel Prizewinner in Economic Sciences Angus Deaton points out:
“Aid undermines what poor people need most: an effective government that works with them for today and tomorrow.”

In other words, "Poverty is not a matter of experts, it's a matter of human rights", according to Economics Professor W. Easterly of New York University. Unfortunately, aid violates both ends of Easterly’s vital message. Aid sends in so called experts (curiously, many are illiterate about  local customs and language) and aid undermines human rights by working with the ruling gang  brutalizing it’s own people--a double whammy that goes against the very poverty that the aid industry is striving to eliminate. The local people are more than capable and talented enough to take care of their own needs and follow their own dreams--if given the chance.

With all due respect, I am a firm believer that the greatest and most important change and perhaps the only change that will ultimately start the momentum in the other direction is that the ruling class get out of the way, in other words, a change in governance. Anything short of that, anything else risks abetting and colluding with continued mal-governance causing the problems that aid attempts to solve. Anything less leads to more of the same and is harmful to the people under the yoke of unethical decision makers of the ruling class and a misguided aid paradigm… not to mention the devastating effects on a swiftly vanishing culture, too. 

I truly believe that the easiest (and paradoxically most difficult) answer might be extraordinarily simple. Would that these aid agents and think tanks simply quit Nepal--they up and left Nepal and Nepalis alone. As Troutman notes in her assessment, the signals are clear and present that quake aid has severe problems. Why isn’t the aid industry aware of and heeding the signals?

Although even if the outsiders did pull out and stop interfering (as Troutman keenly points out, intervening with scant knowledge of the issues, people, language, culture and society that they are attempting to alter), even so, the elite, entitled and empowered ruling class isn't about to cede any power. Still, at least a source of major external funding would dry up and that might be a watershed first step to make the ruling gangsters more answerable to internal forces and entities, namely the people, rather than external entities and forces.

Unfortunately, there is too much money and leverage already woven into the warp and weft of the fabric of the power structure, and the quakes have allowed unethical players to weave an even more entangling pattern. 

When I last was in Nepal in April 2016, it was the worst that I have ever seen it there--from the spirit and morale of the people to infrastructure, state of political and economic activities, the web of political and foreign entanglements and money grubbing interplay…widespread disasters--perhaps the country needs to totally bottom out before going the other direction –dismally, that would mean more deathly suffering as collateral damage to a long suffering, long-disenfranchised people).

The Nepalese people and culture are not forever immune...the cultural ethos may be soon lost if it hasn't been already--the 'bad guys' are winning big at this point which means the people are losing big...not a few of them their health and lives. 

As Economist Dambisa Moyo from Zambia cries out "Let my people go!" in reference to the indefinite aid paradigm that has decimated countries it has touched in Africa. Her data-driven books Dead Aid and How the West Was Lost outline the incriminating evidence.

At any rate, that's the looking glass through which I peer. Perhaps I am a pessimist-- that might be an entirely accurate label of my cloudy outlook. At least I hope to be somewhat of a realist, too. It is a pretty hard outlook regardless.

Cheers for considering this response that is perhaps too long winded—too impassioned about the effects of aid, corruption and exploitation on a country and people whom I love and admire.

Sunday, August 14, 2016

Saturday, August 13, 2016

Friday, August 12, 2016

An inconvenient overlooking while the USA has become an 'idiot's dream'?

Trump recently suggested that 'maybe the second amendment people could stop Hillary' (presumably from changing the makeup of the US Supreme Court if she were elected president of the USA).
Shocking if a threat, and he caught tremendous flak with the media while himself claiming it was only a statement about the united strength of a block of single-issue voters.

Threat or a call to unification of voters concerned over the second amendment, the videos below illustrate that prominent candidates (ironically, gun-control advocates) can be just as if not more duplicitous and inflammatory. The second amendment is unintentionally spotlighted by their ugly statements while they carelessly (and conveniently) overlook their vaunted gun-control advocacy.

Consider the following from Hillary Clinton in 2008:


And the following from Joe Biden in 2008:


...and John Kerry in 2004:



Unbelievably bizarre statements from so-called gun control advocates who smugly call out Trump as a dangerous, violent threat-maker--don't their words seem less ambiguous about violence than his do?

The following additional 'bonus' video of Democrat adviser Bob Beckel in 2010 regarding Julian Assange, founder and voice of Wikileaks:


Beckel's menacing threats might have turned eerily prophetic when Democratic National Committee staffer Seth Rich was murdered in the streets of Washington D.C. in early July 2016 after allegedly providing ruinous material to Wikileaks. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-08-10/wikileaks-assange-hints-murdered-dnc-staffer-was-email-leaker-offers-20k-reward-info

Are we living in an 'idiots dream'?


...more likely a lunatic's dream?

Still doubts about media coverage bias? 

More about gun control hypocrisy and military industrial psychosis at the following links: 
and

Friday, July 22, 2016

Big Sky Butter Tea

Setting my sails for a sky-trek to all points Big Sky Idaho (aka, Idahome), anon…

...searching for a home, home on the range in the Himalaya of North America.

Requesting from Nepal the dispatch of a small convoy of shaggy Himalayan yaks (and naks) in order to fix up a genuine cuppa solja (butter tea) and fend off high plains flurries while reminiscing of golden-emerald pahaaD (hills) and the snow-capped peaks towering above them into nirvana.

Euphonious Interlude...

Wild monkeys are staging a half-hearted yet full-fanged takeover of the ashram...in the meantime, chaos on the streets with righteous pilgrims on the way for a steep climb to Neelkanth Temple--'Bam! Bam! Bhole!!!'

Time for a homemade, full-cream milk coffee...ahhhhh, Samsara...



Friday, July 15, 2016

Literally dying to be politically correct?

So much is happening over the globe these days that might fit under this rubric, and many people have heads bowed and muted to social pressures and other pressures...

…including, without passing any judgments here—illegal immigration which typically takes bread-and-butter work away from the poorest citizens of a country (their jobs are displaced first and foremost) and creates tension in the fabric of a nation as well as greater humanity.

Any brilliant solutions out there?

Friday, July 1, 2016

Neo Stasi?


Graffiti concept Banksy
The following was the prognosis of The Church Committee in 1975--assembled to 'Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities'. It was chaired by Idaho's own son Senator Frank Church (D-ID) and apparently not dire enough for the madding crowd then as well as now:

"The United States government has perfected a technological capability that enables us to monitor the messages that go through the air...at the same time, that capability at any time could be turned around on the American peopleand no American would have any privacy left such is the capability to monitor everything—telephone conversations, telegrams, it doesn't matter. There would be no place to hide.

...the technological capacity that the intelligence community has given the government could enable it to impose total tyranny, and there would be no way to fight back because the most careful effort to combine together in resistance to the government, no matter how privately it was done, is within the reach of the government to know. Such is the capability of this technology...

I don't want to see this country ever go across that bridge. I know the capacity that is there to make tyranny total in America, and we must see to it that this agency and all agencies that possess this technology operate within the law and under proper supervision so that we never cross over that abyss. That is the abyss from which there is no return."
Graffiti concept Banksy
The Intercept reported on July 1st, 2016, Secret Rules Make it Easy for the FBI to Spy on Journalists...What are the FBI's goals with a deep invasion of journalist privacy? Obviously, it silences sources and whistle-blowers…anti-democratic Neo-Stasi tactics?

More related to this topic here, Chinese-Style Censorship

#NeoStasi #FBI #NSA #CIA #ShadowGov #gestapo


Graffiti concept Banksy

Tuesday, June 28, 2016

Chronic Politician?

Graffiti by Banksy
Career public servant in the USA…worth tens of millions of dollars (if not hundreds of millions)...does that add up to integrity in public service?

Now, if a career politician in Nepal (where I was lucky enough to have been posted in the US Peace Corps) was found to be worth millions of dollars, and essentially, s/he had done nothing beyond politics his/her entire career—it would be clearly evident--high chances of hanky-panky, graft and corruption squeezed out of a dysfunctional system. 

The widespread pox of corruption is actually lethal in Nepal. Long-suffering people bear the consequences of a stifling lack of progress and development (despite decades of indefinite aid) and face chronic poverty and its many ills including an inordinate amount of suffering from bone weakening hunger and lack of hygiene and health care to lack of education, human rights and opportunity and much more beyond a lack of basic fundamental necessities.

There seems to be a different gauge in the USA for measuring such malfeasance. At any rate, someone who has been a public servant virtually an entire career and has amassed tens of millions of dollars (if not much hundreds of millions)…

Well, isn’t it obvious?

More on this subject here:



and

#CancerousPolitician #CannibalisticPolitician #ChronicPolitician #CronyMilitarist #CronySocialist

Monday, June 27, 2016

Guess Who Else are not in the Vaunted European Union...

None other than two of the top ten economies in the world...and countries among the most desirable places to live in Europe for quality of life including natural environment, opportunity and personal liberty...

Both are at the peak of the UN's Human Development Index (2015 estimates based on 2014 data puts them at #1 and #3) and both rank in the top ten by GDP (Gross Domestic Product) / PPP (Purchasing Power Parity) per capita (according to two indices, a International Monetary Fund 2015 projected index and a World Bank index using data from 2011-2014).

They are the only two European countries listed in the top ten by GDP/PPP other than tiny Luxembourg (which is in the European Union).

Neither Norway nor Switzerland are part of nor ever have been part of the vaunted European Union. 

Switzerland never had a referendum...Norway rejected it--twice.

Great Britain seems to have set its sails for good company. 

Further reading about the #EUref and #Brexit here, 
Whingeing Pommies?
and
Why Give Distant, Faceless Bureaucrats any Power?

Sunday, June 26, 2016

Whingeing Pommies?

Of course the Brits excel at everything from education and culture to wit and witticism or so they would have us believe.

Nevertheless, will whingeing pommy pettifoggery ever cease? No matter how far from home a Pom roams, they now even decry emancipation from faceless bureaucracy, crony faux-capitalism and crony socialism (most obstreperous are the Egglish from Eggland :)

Enjoy the newfound freedom...if it can be achieved..I truly believe that the fewer people you have telling you what to do, the better off you will be. If regulation is needed, then the nearer regulators are to home the more informed and effective they will be. Right, isn't this bedrock common sense?

Cheers for your consideration. Of course, it's only a perspective...biased by my values and experiences. Some people peer through an entirely different looking glass. If anyone can claim absolute truth on this issue, then I would be even more surprised.

Cheers again for your kind consideration.

More about this here, Why give distant, faceless bureaucrats power without accountability? 
and Guess Who Else are not in the vaunted EU 

Graffiti by Banksy
#Brexit #WhingeingPommies #pettifoggery

Thursday, June 23, 2016

Why give distant, faceless bureaucrats power without accountability?

Similar to aid agents in Nepal who are abetting and colluding with the ruling gangsters…can outsider’s really know how best to overmaster Britain?

Why is there even consideration to allow closed-door, faceless commissars and factotums, largely exempt from their own diktats and decrees, any power--especially power with little to no oversight and accountability?

The more distant a governing class is from the people they govern, the less accountability this ruling class will have and generally, the less voice and freedom for the people governed.

Does Britain really want to allow distant, faceless bureaucrats, crony faux-capitalists and crony socialists any more power whatsoever to govern British lives--any power at all?

Why invite this faceless authority into existence with power over Britain--distant rulers deciding what Britons can and cannot do?

I truly believe that the fewer people you have telling you what to do, the better off you will be.

Of course, it’s only a perspective…biased by my values and experiences. Some people peer through an entirely different looking glass. If anyone can claim absolute truth on this issue, then I’d be even more surprised. 

Cheers for your kind consideration.

More about this here, Whingeing Pommies?
and Guess Who Else are not in the vaunted EU 

Sunday, June 19, 2016

Military Industrial Psychosis with 'Chinese Style Censorship'?

On January 17th, 1961, Dwight D. Eisenhower gave a farewell address with prophetic warnings for modern times. The following are excerpts:

"...public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite."

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist."

"...protected as we are by our moral, economic, and military strength. That [conference] table, though scarred by many past frustrations, cannot be abandoned for the certain agony of the battlefield."
-----
More on this subject here: Neo Stasi?

Graffiti by...Banksy?

Monday, June 13, 2016

Yo Soy De La Casa Samsara

My latest attempt at a Himalayan rhapsody in blue..(don't mind, yes please, dhanyabhad-thank you)...

Nepal's Lost Horizon  (http://realitysandwich.com/320179/nepals-lost-horizon/)