Jane Stillwater's Web Log

2012-01-24T11:15:00.000-08:00

Elizabeth George: Murder mysteries are more than just crime novels

Before this month, I had never even heard of Elizabeth George. But then I read where she will be the featured guest of honor at next year's BoucherCon mystery writers' and fans' convention in Cleveland http://bouchercon2012.com/guests.php -- so I sorta felt obligated to read some of her stuff. And boy am I glad that I did. George is not only a master of the crime novel genre, but she's also clearly the master of almost any fiction genre you can name.

So when Books, Inc. in Alameda announced that George was giving a talk the other day, I just had to go. And after George had talked for about two minutes, it became instantly clear that she was saying important stuff and so I started taking notes as she expounded on what it means to be a writer -- and how to do it too. Here are my notes:

"When writing, the most important thing involved is not what the author thinks -- but what the characters are thinking. Some novels are plot-driven but most are character-driven, and so paying attention to your characters is paramount.

"I prefer to write crime novels because the crime itself serves as a vehicle to get through a book's need for a plot. I trick people into thinking that it's a crime novel -- but actually I'm writing social commentary and so can explore issues broader than just the crime." Aha.

"The reason that I write about the British is because of the challenge involved. When you use that old formula 'Write what you know,' you run the risk of writing the same book over and over, and I never want to write the same book twice." Plus we all know that learning new things is good for one's brain cells -- and mine could use all the help they can get.

"And writing about a place where you don't live is also easier because it's easier to see the nuances of a place that you're not familiar with. And since the setting should always be considered a main character too, you can also be more objective. Plus I'm lucky that my editor encourages me to make every book different instead of demanding the same cookie-cutter approach to all my characters and locations."

One of George's most well-known books is, "What Came Before He Shot Her," which tells us how Inspector Thomas Lynley's pregnant wife Helen came to be gunned down on her own front doorstep. "My challenge was to make Joel Campbell, the boy charged with the crime, to be as sympathetic as Helen Lynley."

Several of George's books have been used as the basis for a Masterpiece Theater series on the BBC. How does she feel about that? "I am a novelist. That is my art form. So I don't get caught up in the motion picture aspects. I'm not involved, so it's no big deal what the BBC does or doesn't do with my characters -- although I was disappointed that they turned my novels into straight mystery stores and left out so much of the social-commentary nuances." She also mentioned that she's not interested in doing another BBC series again.

And why did George choose to write books? "I wrote my first novels simply to entertain myself, but I had known that I was a writer since I was age seven. When I began to write this series, I didn't know much about my characters but, as I wrote, the information slowly appeared. For instance I originally didn't know that Inspector Lynley even had a brother -- let alone that he was an addict. Or that there was a gulf between him and his mother. And I found all that out only as I was writing the books. It's all about creating a character in fiction."

How did George master the Caribbean-flavored dialects she used in "What Came Before He Shot Her"? Lots of research. "I wanted to write about characters doing the best that they can under very difficult circumstances. That was my first goal. Then I went to the Black housing estates themselves in order to learn the dialect spoken there, that Joel Campbell would have used. Writing dialect is tricky. If you write everything in dialect, it is quite hard to read -- so you look for and use only key words that only illustrate that a dialect is being used. For instance, Joel uses the slang version of 'Isn't it' a lot here."

Readers were apparently incensed when George killed off Helen Lynley, comparing it to when Arthur Conan Doyle killed off Sherlock Holmes. "But I knew several books before she finally got shot that Helen Lynley would have to die because I couldn't deal with her pregnancy. A baby would have closed the story down. There ain't much more boring to write about than a baby. At first I thought that a serial killer would bump her off, but that's just too convenient. Plus in Britain today it's more common that someone just shoots you for no known reason at all. So that's what happened to Helen. And although the reader is finally able to see what caused the shooting, the police never do find out either who really did it or why."

Writing and babies? George may be on to something here. Just look what happened to poor Sylvia Plath. Have you ever tried to write something deep and earnest while a four-year-old is bugging you to watch "The Backyardagans"? No easy task. Moral here? That if Helen Lynley had lived, she would have had a really hard time becoming a novelist?

"How do you go about writing and what would your typical writing day be like?" someone then asked George (that would be me).

"I grew up Catholic and am thus incapable of enjoying life because I feel so guilty if I'm not doing something. So I get up at 4:30 am, go running, and then put in six hours of writing in my office. I try to write at least five pages a day, and am currently working on two novels at the same time -- one that takes place in DeLuca, Italy, and one that's a young-adult novel which takes place on Whidbey Island, where I live. And then I eat lunch and work in the garden or learn Italian in order to clear my head."

George also swears by Alfred Hitchcock's famous refrigerator test. "That's when people are still talking about his film even after they've gotten home -- and are looking in the refrigerator for a snack and still saying to themselves, 'Ah, come on. Nobody's going to do that...' Will a plot of mine pass the Refrigerator Test?"

What about setting a murder mystery in America, based conflicts here between the One Percent and the 99 percent -- similar to the class conflicts in Britain that Inspector Lyndley often deals with?

"No -- because the barriers between classes here are permeable, but in the UK it's virtually impossible to pass through class barriers. For instance, the UK tabloid press absolutely hates that Kate Middleton, whose grandfather was a coal miner, may become queen. It would be harder for me to make class differences in America as believable."

No problem there. All she would have to write about is how hard it is to penetrate American corporatist dynasties like the Rockefellers, Bushes, Morgans, Rothschilds, Gettys and Waltons (of Wal-Mart fame). I rest my case!

And what about research? "Never let it get in the way of your story. I always write about what I want to learn about -- not what I already know. I like to have a challenge when I write."

So how about this for the ultimate crime-novel-writing challenge: To write about who killed democracy in America and how the corporatist bad guys almost got away with the murder -- until Inspector Lynley solves the crime, gets the evil-doers convicted and then puts all these slimy corporatist bastards in jail where they belong.

And then George could definitely have fun combining this murder mystery plot with a LOT of social commentary.

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Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare dollar. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

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Fortune Telling: If you scan a photocopy of the lifeline on the palm of your dominant hand, e-mail it to me at jpstillwater(at)yahoo.com with "Madame Jane" in the subject line, and then slip five dollars into my PayPal account, I can (and will) get Madame Jane to tell you approximately how long you are gonna live -- and also have her throw in some stuff about quality-of-life as well.

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I recently got my Notary Public commission!

Need a Notary Public? Have seal, will travel. E-mail me at jpstillwater@yahoo.com and I'll stamp your document, make it official and only charge $10. Of course if you live outside of Berkeley, I may have to charge travel expenses -- but am well worth it!

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Want something good to read? Buy my book! "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips for Touring Today's Middle East," available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. http://www.amazon.com/Bring-Your-Own-Flak-Jacket/dp/0978615719/ref=cm_pdp_rev_itm_title_1. It's like if Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain and/or Janet Evanovich went to war.

I also wrote a book about going on Hajj (also included as a chapter in "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket," but this book is cheaper -- but it's worth buying them both!) My book on the Hajj is so outstanding that I bet even Christian fundamentalists will love it! Please buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/Mecca-Hajj-Lessons-Islamic-School/dp/0978615700/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1238806637&sr=1-2

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"Imagine a world where EVERY child is wanted, nurtured, protected and loved: World peace in one generation!" You can now buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for parents and teachers. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters

"Life is a competition. The winners are the ones who do the most good deeds." You can also buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for those of us who are still idealists in these troubled times. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters

2012-01-20T09:46:00.000-08:00

E Cannabis Unum: Has medical marijuana helped my sore knees?

I've just about tried everything there is to make my sore knees and right ankle feel better -- physical therapy, acupuncture, SynVisc (nasty stuff), chiropractic, Advil, hydrotherapy, Tiger Balm, xi gong, steam baths, reiki, Filipino psychic surgery, hypnotherapy, Zam-Zam water, deep-tissue massage, yoga,.. You name it and I've tried it. But nothing has worked -- until now.

Now I've discovered "DocGreen's Therapeutic Healing Cream," which is made from shea butter, palm oil, vegetable wax and cannabis. That's right, you read that right. I am currently rubbing marijuana onto my knees.

And, yes, it's legal. And, yes, it works.

"But where did you get this stuff?" you might ask. "While standing on a corner in West Oakland? After skipping across the border to Tijuana? By following hippies around up on Telegraph? In the evidence room at the DEA? Where?"

I got it at my friendly local marijuana dispensary http://www.harborsidehealthcenter.com/. And what a trip that was too, with all kinds of types -- from arthritic old ladies and dying cancer patients to young men and women who looked like they've never been sick a day in their life -- standing in a really long line and waiting their turn in front of a huge display counter featuring everything from manufactured doobies and sativa buds to infused chocolates and ointments like the kind that I got.

But, hey, DocGreen's soothing therapeutic ointment worked.

Plus it also made me sort of happy -- a big surprise there. Not that I was stoned or zonked or nothing, and there was definitely no slow-motion-type incapacitation or uncontrollable munchies like I've heard that you get from eating dope brownies or smoking a spliff. And there was none of that sudden Bob Marley "one-love" positive-vib stuff either. I still have all the same worries and troubles that I used to have before -- that corporatists are still destroying our country and my tooth still hurts and I'm still overdrawn at the bank -- but now I'm just a little bit less on edge about all that and a little bit more able to cope.

PS: I figured that since just a little bit of DocGreen's healing therapeutic moisturizer helped my soreness and also my frame of mind, then perhaps I should try a bit more. So I rubbed some of the ointment onto my sore neck as well. Wrong thing to do. An immediate headache resulted, and then I started worrying again all over -- but this time more fiercely. Oh rats. I just knew it was too good to be true. Looks like I'd better go back to trying holy water and saunas.

But then I listened to Layna Berman on KPFA and she said that many people end up getting addicted to various substances by trying to "take the edge off" their lives. Hey, I wanna take the edge off! But according to Berman, no, that's not a good idea, Apparently having worries is a good thing -- because they force you to act, to try out different things that might end all those worries. Perhaps like joining OWS in order to end the corporatists' sleazy reign of terror in Washington? Oh, okay.

Berman also stated that by using outside means of cheering oneself up, then our body loses its own ability to cheer itself up.

PPS: Then I listened to a video on "Full Disclosure" that talked about how California is being taken over by Mexican drug lords -- even including taking over the legal medical marijuana trade. Yikes!

According to a recent "Full Disclosure" report, "Mexican Drug Cartels are controlling industrial farming of Marijuana while enslaving both the illegal alien laborers and the U. S. Farmers. Once entrapped by the Cartels, they are unable escape with their lives." http://www.fulldisclosure.net/Blogs/107.php

Double yikes! Now I'm in danger of becoming a member of the Sinaloa drug cartel! Just because I've got bad knees.

PPPS: If marijuana is illegal, shouldn't they make all those other artificial feel-good substances illegal too? Like cigarettes and booze? Wouldn't it be nice if you had to have a doctor's prescription before you could set foot into a liquor store?

PPPPS: Someone else just recommended that I just simply stick to eating mushrooms. According to a recent TED video on the subject, mushrooms are the last best hope for this planet and we can even use them instead of fossil fuel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XI5frPV58tY Yeah, but can mushrooms make my ankle and knees (and brain) feel any better?

PPPPS: Then I went up to that dispensary on Telegraph Avenue at http://berkeleypatientscare.com/ and got a chocolate infusion to eat. Forget that! One small bite almost the size of a baby's fingernail and I was absolutely frozen in place for the next TWELVE WHOLE HOURS. I couldn't even get to my computer to call for help on FaceBook!

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This article is Part One of an ongoing series regarding the advantages and disadvantages of using medical marijuana. And if anyone wants to try DocGreen's Therapeutic Healing Cream, please let me know and I'll give you the 411.

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Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare buck. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

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Fortune Telling: If you scan a photocopy of the lifeline on the palm of your dominant hand, e-mail it to me at jpstillwater(at)yahoo.com with "Madame Jane" in the subject line, and then slip five dollars into my PayPal account, I can (and will) get Madame Jane to tell you approximately how long you are gonna live -- and also have her throw in some stuff about quality-of-life as well.

****

2012-01-13T11:20:00.000-08:00

Bizarre News: What American corporatists are getting away with now

After I got my long hair caught in a vacuum cleaner the other day, my first thought was pure terror -- like I had just been attacked by werewolves or vampires with claws! But then my second thought was, "Gee, at least I HAVE a vacuum cleaner".

Despite the recent huge economic downturn, most Americans are still relatively well-off right now, even me. Sure, our infrastructure sucks eggs and we mostly have run-down schools and hospitals, but at least we still have them. Old and run down. But still functioning at least.

But wait! Perhaps help for our hospitals is finally on the way! Is it really true that American corporatists have recently decided to spend over nine billion dollars to build at least 20 brand new state-of-the-art hospitals in Georgia? According to RT News, yes indeed this is true.

The only problem here, however, is that the corporatists who currently own our country are now in the process of building these 20 wonderful new hospitals in the former Soviet-bloc state of Georgia -- not in the American state with the same name that's famous for peaches and Braves. http://rt.com/politics/us-georgia-iran-war-441/

How bizarre is that news?

And now I've just read where American corporatists have recently sent in the U.S. Coast Guard to break up a strike by American longshoremen. That's even more bizarre than getting one's hair sucked into a vacuum cleaner -- and even more painful. One can always just cut one's hair off, but forcing America's military to act like low-life strike-breaking scabs? That's a cut to our democracy that may never heal.

ILWU members had been promised jobs in Longview as a priority condition for allowing corporatists to receive massive federal subsidies to build a new terminal at the Washington state port. But after the terminal was safely built, greedy corporatist slugs then fired the longshoremen's union members point-blank -- and not only got away with it but used the U.S. military as their own personal enforcers and thugs. http://www.longshoreshippingnews.com/2011/10/san-francisco-unions-support-ilwu-local-21-at-egt/.

Am I the only one that finds this news a bit bizarre?

American coproratists seem to be getting away with EVERYTHING these days. Cheating on elections, throwing people out of their homes, never paying taxes, robbing our treasury blind, fighting undeclared wars for fun and profit on our dime, beating protesting citizens with clubs, buying off Congress, etc. But almost nobody in America seems to want to stop them.

Here's more bizarre news -- Stephen Cobert's video explaining how corporatist superPACs steal our elections: http://www.colbertsuperpac.com/

Had enough yet? Or do you want to read some even more bizarre news about what corporatists are getting away with now? Yes? Then take a long look at this: The unassailable New York Times, the esteemed Gray Lady herself, recently reported that the IAEA had accused Iran of using its nuclear program to develop military weapons. But guess what? The IAEA had said no such thing. Now the esteemed Gray Lady has lied to us (again) in order to get us into a useless and unnecessary war (again) that would only benefit corporatists. http://publiceditor.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/10/times-errors-irans-nukes-sfs-voting/

Very deja vu. Very bizarre.

But -- to me (but apparently to nobody else) -- this is the absolute most bizarre news of all: Perry, Santorum, Obama, Romney and even Newt Gingrich and JEB Bush are all running on a platform of being good Christians. Huh? What?

NO ONE who either calls for the bombing women and children in Asia, the Middle East, Africa and America -- or is actually out doing it -- can EVER call himself or herself a good Christian. Ever. These people are no more good Christians than was Attila the Hun.

Send drones to kill babies? Where in the Bible does it say that Jesus did that?

Leaving the meek of the earth to starve to death and the peacemakers of the world to be jailed? Jesus is down with that too? Not!

"Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,for theirs is the kingdom of heaven," said Jesus. Beating down non-violent OWS protesters with pepper spray, tear gas and truncheons? NOT CHRISTIAN. Not Christian at all.

Yet no one seems to be calling these monsters out on their uber-hypocracy. No one calls them out at all. That's bizarre.

And it's also rather bizarre that all these corporatist presidential candidates are happily telling us that they are in favor of "Democracy". There is NOTHING less democratic than a corporation. Face it, CEOs are tyrants. Corporatists worship the dictatorship model. To tell us that they want America to remain a democracy is absurd.

Corporatists by definition are top-down kinds of guys, "Do what I say or else you will lose all." Corporatists by definition are bullying-type authoritarians who spit on America's treasured democratic principles -- and don't you ever forget it!

Now let's turn to the comic-page section of the news.

The average American today seems to more and more resemble that Peanuts cartoon character Charlie Brown -- always trusting that somehow Lucy will let him finally kick the football. But guess what? No matter how many times you vote for the party of Bush-Obama-Romney-Santorum-Clinton-Paul or believe mainstream media reports or trust corporatists to finally hold the ball upright, you are still gonna get tricked every time. And you're still gonna land flat on your face while corporatist secretly laugh at you as you lie there in the mud. And it's still gonna hurt.

How's that for bizarre news?

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Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare buck. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

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Fortune Telling: If you scan a photocopy of the lifeline on the palm of your dominant hand, e-mail it to me at jpstillwater(at)yahoo.com and then slip five dollars into my PayPal account, I can (and will) have Madame Jane tell you approximately how long you are gonna live -- and also have her throw in some stuff about quality-of-life as well.

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2012-01-06T12:37:00.000-08:00

A war on Iran? Let's do it!

[Author's note: For the wiser of us, this article may appear to be a satire but for the rest of us, a war on Iran might actually seem more like a macho wet-dream come true -- once again confirming Plato's most excellent cave theory...]

Let's put our money where our mouth is, stop constantly blathering on about how desperately we want to launch a war on Iran -- and just do it. I'm bored with life anyway -- and there's really not much else going on between now and when the next season of "Survivor" starts up.

Almost all of the Republican presidential candidates this year seem to be rabidly in favor of a war on Iran (except, of course, for Ron Paul -- but he's never given any media airtime so he doesn't count). So let's vote for Romney or Gingrich or Santorum or that GOP wannabe Obama or Perry or whoever. I'm tired of just playing video-game wars and watching war movies. I want to see the real thing. Again.

Republicans, GOP wannabes and their corporatist buddies on Wall Street already have an excellent "make-a-war" track record. They've already gotten us into that bloody, expensive and deadly war on Iraq, that terrible, unnecessary and grisly war on Afghanistan, and that truly weird war on Libya wherein Al Qaeda was actually our ally.

When it comes to starting exciting-but-disastrous wars, Republicans and corporatists have turned out to be real pros. So, pretty pleeze, give these cool-crazy dudes yet another shot at getting us into yet another meaningless, expensive and bloody war -- this time a war on Iran. I can hardly wait! How exciting is that!

Do you ever watch TrueBlood on TV? And don'tcha just love it when they stage their vampire wars? Lots of carnage, lots of blood. Very entertaining. But a war on Iran would be even better -- another American vampire war on the Middle East, only ours are fought with real blood.

Go ahead, guys. Get this war started. Entertain me.

And when things go awry like they always do during wartime, then you and me will probably be dead too -- when corporatist vampires start sucking blood from us as well as from Arabs and Persians. Go ahead, bite me!

Can't you just hardly wait for this next war to start?

And it looks like we're not gonna have to wait very long either.

According to WhiteOut Press http://www.whiteoutpress.com/articles/q12012/us-troops-going-to-israel483/, "In one of the most blacked-out stories in America right now, the US military is preparing to send thousands of US troops, along with US Naval anti-missile ships and accompanying support personnel, to Israel." U.S. boots on the ground in Israel? What? Now all of a sudden the IDF isn't good enough for Ehud Barak and he wants our boys over there too?

But why?

The poor enslaved Palestinians have already been subjugated and subdued by the IDF to the point of embarrassment (it's getting harder and harder these days for Israeli corporatists to pretend that Israel is in danger -- or even a democracy or even barely Jewish), so obviously our troops won't be needed to enslave more Palestinians or steal more of their land. That's already a done deal. So perhaps this sudden need for U.S. missiles and U.S. troops on the ground indicates that our Ehud might want Washington's help in enslaving and subduing Iran as well -- turning it into yet another open-air prison like Gaza.

According to Israeli journalist Uri Avnery, however, that's never going to happen and we're all gonna end up with a swamp of a war instead because if America and Israel do attack, then Iran will simply block the Strait of Hormuz -- and there's not much that even American vampires can do about that.

"Still the Iranian missiles will come in," writes Avnery, "making passage through the strait impossible. What next? There will be no alternative to 'boots on the ground'. The US army will have to land on the shore and occupy all the territory from which missiles can be effectively launched. That would be a major operation. Fierce Iranian resistance must be expected, judging from the experience of the eight-year Iraqi-Iranian war. The oil wells in neighboring Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states will also be hit. Such a war would go far beyond the dimensions of the American invasions of Iraq or Afghanistan, perhaps even of Vietnam." http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/channels/avnery/1325859818/

Yay! Bring it on!

According to Middle East expert David Pratt, "Some European countries, notably France, seem keen to fall in behind Washington's sanctions bill signed by President Barack Obama on December 31. Earlier this week French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe urged EU countries to follow the US lead in freezing Iranian bank assets and imposing an embargo on oil exports." http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/columnists/sense-must-prevail-to-avoid-iran-catastrophe.16371043

Oh goody! Now Europe wants to get in on the action too! Now we'll all die for sure as the war on Iran begins to expand and sweep across the rest of the Middle East, Israel AND Europe -- and then possibly on to America as well, probably leaving only those One Percent guys alive in their bunkers and in a good position to snatch up whatever pieces of prime real estate that are still left standing.

And I'll have my own piece of prime real estate too -- the plot next to my parents at Skylawn. Face it, guys. I always wanted to be a zombie -- and here's my big chance! Grateful dead, move on over.

"But Jane," you might ask, "why are you being so pessimistic? All those experts are wrong and the Repubs are right. America can easily win a war on Iran." Nope, nope, nope. Iran is not just some camel-driven economy that is barely out of the stone age. Tehran is as civilized as Paris or Rome. I've been there, I've seen the place. It's got the internet and traffic gridlock and everything. It's even got Gucci, Benneton and Calvin Klein! http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com/2011/01/iran-vs.html

Iran also has at least 20 submarines and all kinds of missiles. Should America or Israel attack Iran, there would definitely be a hot time in the old town tonight. And not just in Tehran -- but also in Tel Aviv, Paris, London and perhaps even Washington DC as well. Get out the marshmallows, folks! This war will definitely heat up. We're good to go.

According to Global Research at http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=28511, "The Iranian defense has the capability to sink not one, but many US Naval ships currently flexing their muscles on the periphery of Iranian territorial waters. Such an event would register with shock and horror in the US public mind, but worse, may be used by Washington hawks to justify a revenge nuclear strike against Iranian civilians. Both Washington and Tel Aviv have already raised the talking point of deploying 'tactical nukes' against Iran....

"Any nuclear conflagration by the US or Israel would most certainly result in a global backlash against the West – at its worst acting as a procession into the hot stages of World War III – or at its very least, re-balkanizing the geopolitical scene into a New Cold War, with the West on one side and Iran, China, Pakistan, and Russia on the other."

Barbeque time? Oh yeah. We might even end up being able to roast hot dogs 24/7 almost anywhere in the world -- or be dead.

PS: I recently saw a really excellent movie (here's a review of it: http://www.ebertpresents.com/movies/a-dangerous-method/videos/338) about Freud and Jung and Jung's mistress, Kiera Knightly -- and they all got together and talked about Eros and Thanatos and the human mind's bizarre attraction to death. Hey, I'm attracted to death too! Death is sexy as hell. But I'm obviously not the only one that is attracted to death. Apparently our so-called leaders in Washington are too.

Love or Death? "TrueBlood" or "Survivor"? I'm sort of kinky that way -- bored of living -- so I think that I'll go with TrueBlood.

Which one will you chose?

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Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist economics, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare buck. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

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If you scan a photocopy of the lifeline on your dominant hand and e-mail it to me at jpstillwater(at)yahoo.com and slip five dollars into my PayPal account, I can (and will) tell you approximately how long you are gonna live -- and also through in some stuff about quality-of-life as well.

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2011-12-31T15:10:00.000-08:00

"I can't do this any more": Homeless people in America are dying

As I was walking down Shattuck Avenue in Berkeley yesterday, I passed a homeless man huddled against the cold at a bus stop bench near the corner of Shattuck and Channing -- and the man was talking to himself. "I just can't do this any more," he was saying. "I just can't."

I felt so bad for this poor guy that I gave him a few dollars -- yeah, like a measly two bucks might even begin to help stop his hunger, chill, weariness and desperation.

A week from now -- or perhaps a month from now or, hopefully, maybe even a year -- that man will most probably be dead.

Living out in the cold, having very little food to eat, having no healthcare or dental care options, having no warm place to stay, lacking even a toilet or a shower, having nothing but rags to wear, and having no place to feel safe? That level of deprivation can actually kill people. Under these bleak circumstances, I myself would probably be dead within days. And what about you? How long could you survive that kind of merciless gauntlet, that kind of ordeal?

"I can't do this any more."

And recently the mayor of Oakland has actually had the chutzpah to accuse OWS of committing "economic violence". That really takes some nerve -- when you consider that, for the past 30 years, 99% of America has had to suffer endless and brutal economic violence under the jackboot of Wall Street and banksters and their lapdogs in Congress, on the Supreme Court and in the White House. "Economic violence"? Us? You gotta be kidding, Mayor Quan!

And also here's a belated Christmas carol video, coming to us from the deep and dreamless streets of Bethlehem -- where people still optimistically celebrate the birth of the Prince of Peace, even after having suffered over 60 years of occupation under corporatist Israel's brutal and merciless jackboots: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtSTLWLpSD0&feature=share

I wonder if Americans will be holding up even half as well as the Palestinians have done after we too have spent 60-plus years under corporatist domination.

Probably, if American corporatists have their way by then, most of the rest of America will be homeless too -- and, like the man on the corner of Shattuck and Channing, muttering desperately to ourselves, "I can't do this any more."

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2011-12-31T13:41:00.000-08:00

Please help: Zakaria Zubeidi of the Jenin Freedom Theater is in trouble!

The freaking Israeli corporatists have done it again and gone back on their word once more. No wonder Republicans love them. Liars and bullies always seek their own level. But I digress.

Zakaria Zubeidi is a co-founder and mentor of the Jenin Freedom Theater in the West Bank -- and after the blankity-blank Israeli corporatists attempted to destroy Jenin back in 2002, Zakaria was an important component in the group of freedom fighters who fought back to save their loved ones and their homes from corporatist occupation. And after the dust had settled, Zakaria was given amnesty by the occupiers.

Zakaria then kept his part of the bargain to stay cool and went to work designing and shaping Jenin's non-violent Freedom Theater. But now Israeli corporatist punks are all threatening to break their part of the bargain and either assassinate Zakaria or throw him in jail and throw away the key. Good grief, how Israeli corporatists hate non-violent action! Almost as much as they hate keeping their word (remember Oslo, Camp David, etc? I rest my case!)

So how about performing a little non-violent action of our own in Zakaria's defense? Call your Israeli MP or ambassador or whatever. And also donate to the Freedom Theater's defense as well. Or even go to Jenin yourself and bring OWS with you! http://www.thefreedomtheatre.org/news.php?id=213

It's time for Israeli corporatists to stop trying to take over the Middle East -- just like it's time for their corporatist buddies in America to stop trying to take over the world. Humph.

****
Here is some contact information:
The Israeli district commanding officer: +972 42433046
PA security safety office: +972 42436752

Israeli Ambassador to the US, Michael Oren, 202 364 5500
infor@washington.mfa.gov.il

2011-12-26T10:56:00.000-08:00

Saul's Jewish Delicatessen, Berkeley's secret Christmas tradition?

For the past several years, my family and I have eaten our annual Christmas dinner at Saul's Jewish and Middle Eastern Restaurant and Delicatessen http://www.saulsdeli.com/ in north Berkeley. One of the few local restaurants open on December 25, Saul's was the perfect holiday alternative for us all: Good food, fast seating, the children liked it and, best of all, I didn't have to cook anything. Dining at Saul's on Christmas Day used to be our own personal family secret tradition.

But not any more!

When we arrived at Saul's on December 25th of this year, it was mobbed. There was a Klezmer band playing out on the sidewalk, a taco-truck in the parking lot selling latkes, and a whole bunch of happy people enthusiastically dancing the hora. It was wonderful. I loved it. But the waiting list to get in to eat at the restaurant proper was half a block long, and it would have been at least another hour before we could eat.

Our little holiday secret hideaway had definitely been discovered.

What to do next?

By this time, we were really really hungry -- so we all packed off to Skates by the Bay and ate our Christmas dinner with a magnificent view of the San Francisco bay instead.

The view from Skates always takes my breath away and the ambiance was full of holiday cheer and the server was excellent and the soup, salad and desserts were all totally delicious and we were all really glad that we had come belatedly to Skates. But the salmon was far too dry for me to finish and definitely not as good as the lox and bagels served at Saul's on Christmas Day -- and after all, long before Jesus's beliefs had been adopted by Christians and Muslims, Christ himself had been Jewish.

And Christ's main teaching was that we human beings should at least all TRY to get along.

PS: My mother, who was raised poor as a church-mouse, used to have a saying that she would trot out whenever anything good happened to her: "Wonder what the poor people are doing." Well, this Christmas I was lucky enough to be able to use this saying a lot.

Not only did I get to dance the hora at Saul's and eat dried salmon within view of the San Francisco Bay, a place that is sacred to the Ohlone First Americans, but later in the day I also had Chinese dim sum at Mena's mom's house.

And on Christmas Eve, I also ate Muslim food at La Mediterranee restaurant (glutton-free tabuli made with quinoa!) and also a wonderful Greek salad at Pizza Rustica in tribute to Orthodox Christmas liturgies at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem -- after it had been bombed by the blasphemously corporatist IDF. And then I ate posole and tamales with our extended Mexican-American family in Richmond.

Hey, now I'm stuffed.

But I bet you anything that Jesus would have approved -- but only if all the poor of the world could have joined me as well.

2011-12-22T08:02:00.000-08:00

Living in Interesting Times: Why our grandchildren are gonna hate us

I just started work at a part-time telecommute job that involves writing text for various online websites. And since my new gig only pays approximately one-fourth of a penny per word, I'm obviously not in this for the money -- but I do enjoy its challenge. The boss sends me a subject to write about knowledgeably and I do it.

Here's a hot topic to write about: "Why we live in interesting times." In 500 words or less? I can do that.

We live in interesting times because World War I was a mistake and it killed off millions of people and polluted the air and gave us Stalin and Hitler as a result.

We live in interesting times because after the Great Depression finally made Americans thrifty for a change, we once again began wildly spending money on war, pollution and other useless junk. World War II was another big mistake. From Nanking, Tokyo and Berlin to London, Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima -- hundreds of millions more useless dead bodies, hundreds of millions of tons of more polluted air.

Then came the 1950s and the rise of suburbs, the Cold War and the corporate hit-man. More death abroad and more pollution at home. More interesting times.

Have I reached my 500-word requirement yet?

We live in interesting times because the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War and the various recent Middle East wars -- Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, etc. -- have brought us even more senseless death and irreversible air pollution. And now the Pentagon, Congress and the White House have started beating their war drums against Iran, Syria and China. World War III? Seriously? http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=28254

We live in interesting times because now we are going to have to explain to our grandchildren how we willingly squandered their patrimony on a century of brutal destruction, death, repression, and planet-wide pollution -- when we could have been building an earthly paradise for them to inherit instead.

We live in interesting times because we are handing off to our grandchildren the mere shell of a planet that used to be rich in resources beyond anyone's wildest dreams and a sentient world that is apparently facing extinction http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/12/05-8

And we also live in interesting times because, even as we speak, the military-industrial complex that now owns our government is still happily destroying what is left of our grandchildren's patrimony while even more happily entertaining itself with fond dreams of more and more violent death and rank pollution to come.

But I've clearly written more than 500 words on this subject. Sorry about that.

PS: These photos are from some of my granddaughter Mena's several recent "Movable Feast" birthday parties. Mena is four years old already -- and doesn't hate me so far!

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2011-12-16T18:44:00.001-08:00

World-wide, women are in trouble: "First they came for our daughters, then they..."

I was just told by my dentist that I need three cavities filled, two teeth crowned and two root canals. We're talking at least $10,000 here, probably more. But who has that kind of money these days? Looks like pretty soon I'm going to have to go toothless. But I won't be alone. 99% of the rest of America may be facing toothlessness too. What an ugly country we will become -- nothing but gums.

Also, I pretty much can't afford to travel any more, but that's okay. Scottish journalist David Pratt now does most of my traveling for me -- and sends his reports from all corners of the world back to the Glasgow Sunday Herald, which then forwards them to me.

Pratt's latest report is from the slums of Nairobi, Kenya, where women and children live in such unbelievable poverty that even I can't believe it. As part of a series entitled "Women of the World's Worst Slums," Pratt spells it all out for us. http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/the-women-of-the-worlds-worst-slums.16118795

"I wanted to find out for myself what it's like for the women here who lead a life of fear, unremitting toil, and who worry constantly over the disease and hunger that stalks their children. In the back alleyways of [Nairobi's two largest] slums I was to meet four such women, young and not so young. What follows is a glimpse into their hopes, fears and above all fight for survival in the heart of this human abyss."

The first woman that Pratt interviewed was 21-year-old Purity Atieno, who lives in little more than a wooden crate, in a neighborhood flooded with human feces, sewage and rats. Hardly out of her teens, Purity is already the mother of three sons. Pratt didn't actually comment on whether or not Purity's babies were a result of her having to sell her body in order to buy food, or of the constant rapes perpetrated against women here night and day -- but he did state that she constantly had to deal with the rapists who prowled through her community each night.

Next, Juan Gonzalez of "Democracy Now" interviewed Yanar Mohammed from Baghdad, who informed us that Iraq is currently one big hot mess as a result of Junior's stupid and unnecessary war. "And the biggest loser out of all of this are the women.... At a women’s organization, we daily meet women who are vulnerable to being bought and sold in the flesh market. We see widows who have no source of income, and nobody to get them IDs for themselves and their children, because they have been internally displaced. So poverty and discrimination against women has become the norm."

She then goes on to state that there is now a whole generation of women in Iraq who are totally illiterate -- as compared to all the many female college graduates there under Saddam Hussein. http://www.democracynow.org/2011/12/16/iraqi_womens_activist_rebuffs_us_claims

And then there's the good old USA. I don't have to travel widely here at all -- because I can see what is happening to women in America just by traveling to nearby homeless encampments. And a lot of women at the encampments are toothless too, just like I'm going to be soon.

And if Republicans have their way, American women will also be hungry, illiterate, jobless, barefoot and pregnant as well.

But as Martin Luther King Jr. once said, "Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice." Isn't it time that freedom's arc started bending toward justice for women too?

No, ladies, that arc is never gonna bend toward us voluntarily. If we ever want that to happen, we alone are gonna have to stop the killing, stop the raping, stop the war machine and stop the war-on-women all by ourselves.

And to paraphrase a famous cautionary quote about Nazis, "First they came for our daughters -- and I did nothing. Then they came for the crones and then they came for all women. And I did nothing. And now there is no one left to reproduce the human race." Too bad for you.

PS: So how, exactly, will we women -- never outnumbered but always out-gunned -- still manage to fight back? Perhaps by copying guerrilla tactics used recently by Occupy Portland: Retreat and advance like the wind, don't ever let them pin us down -- and do it all to music, especially rock and roll. http://www.portlandoccupier.org/2011/12/15/occupy-portland-outsmarts-police-creating-blueprint-for-other-occupations/

PPS: Forget what I just said. If we women ever do start to fight back against injustice, then every woman on the planet will be instantly labeled a terrorist -- not to mention being charged with committing "economic violence," whatever that is.

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2011-12-14T11:42:00.000-08:00

Addicted again: Going cold-turkey from dairy, sugar, wheat & Wall Street

I used to be addicted to love. But now I'm just addicted to food. How pathetic is that.

But actually, it really does turn out that wheat and dairy really can cause actual addictive symptoms -- plus we already know that sugar and sugar substitutes are addictive. If you have any doubts about that one, just try convincing your kids to give up their daily sugar fix. You might have to put them on methadone first!

The other evening I went to hear a prominent nutritionist give a lecture on how to eat healthy and she told us, "Gluten-containing foods such as wheat, barley, rye, spelt and most forms of oats can actually produce an addictive reaction. And dairy products can trigger an addictive response too." That certainly explains why I'm addicted to pumpkin pie smothered with whipped cream on top.

"Gluten-containing foods are not only addictive but they can also destroy the delicate villi that line our small intestines. The negative effect caused by depleted villi is that nutrients in your food can no longer be absorbed, resulting in dizziness, asthma, depression, fatigue, foggy brain syndrome and even cancer." Yikes! I gots foggy brain syndrome! I'm doomed.

So yesterday morning I decided to go cold-turkey and stop eating wheat and sugar and dairy. "And how's that been going for you?" you might ask. Not so good. Aside from suffering from intense withdrawal symptoms such as headaches and hunger DTs, I also soon discovered that, aside from sugar, dairy and gluten, there's pretty much nothing else that's exciting to eat. But I'm hanging in there -- and desperately trying to convince MediCare to send me to some posh sugar-dairy-gluten re-hab clinic in SoCal. Yeah right.

PS: There has been one small benefit from going cold turkey from SDG -- I've lost five whole pounds in just the last week.

PPS: Americans such as myself also seem to be addicted to television too. Well, here's a word of advice for those of us with a channel-surfing addiction: Don't believe everything you see on TV.

For instance, don't ever believe that war is a good thing.

And also stop believing that Occupy Wall Street is just a passing phase filled with crazies, or that anything that's good for the rich who now own our country is also good for the rest of us too -- because America's current addiction to the One Percent's attitude of "Let them eat cake" is clearly one hecka dangerous gluten addiction.

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2011-12-09T11:09:00.000-08:00

(Here's a photo of me, marching in Montgomery while seven months pregnant with baby Lorraine. Love the glasses, made the dress myself.)

"Wallace, you never can jail us all": But Wells Fargo can

I am still totally pissed off at Wells Fargo after they callously and mercilessly ruined a friend of mine's credit by charging her outrageous fees for an "overdraft protection" service that she never signed up for http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com/2011/03/wells-fargos-illegal-overdraft.html. And now I'm all pissed off at Wells Fargo for about 16 trillion other reasons as well -- none of them cool.

According to Rep. Alan Grayson's revealing synopsis of the GAO's recent Federal Reserve audit, "The main, if not the sole, qualification for getting help from the Fed was to have lost huge amounts of money. The [16-trillion-dollar] Fed bailouts rewarded failure, and penalized success." http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-alan-grayson/the-fed-bailouts-money-fo_b_1129988.html

Hey, if my friend's credit is so bad, then why didn't the Feds bail her out too -- like they did Wells Fargo?

But Wells Fargo isn't the only target for my wrath. I'm also pissed off at General Electric and will never ever ever buy another appliance or light bulb or drone from them ever again. And you shouldn't either. Those guys are evil zombie war profiteers, sucking America's very life-blood away -- at our own expense. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNkX6LJSaWE&feature=relmfu

In fact, I am totally pissed off at just about everyone who is stealing from America's treasury -- K Street lobbyists, Supreme Court justices, war-profiteers, Wall Street insiders, the Federal Reserve, White House staffers, congressional puppets of the corporatocracy, off-shore out-sourcers, mountain-top removers, ALL of those corporate-welfare-receiving pirates who are happily busy raping and pillaging America.

And now all these evil corporatist bad guys are threatening to throw us in jail? To throw anyone who objects to being robbed by America's new robber barons in jail? That's what I'm hearing from internet chatter -- that corporatists are now building concentration camps especially designed to hold all us average salt-of-the-earth Main Street schmucks who are finally getting pissed off.

Back in the 1960s, when thousands of us marched on Montgomery with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., we all sang a song that went something like this: "Oh, Wallace, you never can jail us all!" Well, those days are gone and now Congress and Obama and Cheney and General Electric and Wells Fargo are also threatening to jail us all -- but, unlike Wallace, they CAN. http://www.bagnewsnotes.com/2011/12/occupy-forcing-militarized-pds-to-show-their-colors/.

According to the ACLU, "The Senate voted last Thursday [December 1, 20011] to pass S. 1867, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which would authorize the president to send the military literally anywhere in the world to imprison civilians without charge or trial. Prison based on suspicion alone. The power is so sweeping that the president would be able to direct the military to use its powers within the United States itself, and even lock up American citizens without charge or trial. No corner of the world, not even your own home, would be off-limits to the military." http://www.aclu.org/blog/tag/NDAA

And why shouldn't corporatists want to jail us all? Just think of all that access to free labor they'll get!

Corporatists in Germany back in the 1940s profited a lot from prison-camp labor. So why shouldn't corporatists today also give it a whirl? Why indeed.

See ya in the hoosegow, folks.

And I'm calling "dibs" on the first bottom bunk to the left of the tent flap.

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2011-11-30T12:01:00.000-08:00

Madam Jane predicts: American wars will cause deadly climate change

I just had a dream that it was the end of the world. So should I still go Christmas shopping or not? Why bother, I thought. But just to be on the safe side, I also asked the mysterious psychic Madam Jane for some input. "Are my dreams and the Mayan calendars and all those Rapture freaks right? Is the end of the world actually on its way? Are we really all gonna die soon?"

"Yes of course," replied Madam Jane.

Oh dear.

"The amount of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere is mounting at a catastrophic rate and will cause irreversibly-disastrous climate change in the next five years -- and by far the biggest cause of this problem is the U.S. military and its allies. Every time NATO bombs Libya and Americans bomb Pakistan and Israel bombs Gaza or a helicopter takes off in Afghanistan or a U.S. carrier fleet steams toward Syria and the Persian Gulf, we move one step closer to irreversible climate change," stated Madam Jane, swaying back and forth with her eyes closed.

"Would it help at all if I had my car smog-checked today?" I then asked her hopefully. Madame Jane just rolled her eyes. "We're doomed," she replied.

So. How do I want to spend my last days here on Earth? Not a clue. If you knew that seven billion people had approximately five years to live before climate-change-caused floods started pouring in from our rivers, and deserts started taking over our farmlands and oceans started drowning our coastal cities and a dreadful ice age started to set in, what would you do?

"I'd move to Hawaii," replied Madam Jane. Not me. I'd buy hip-waders, ear muffs and really warm coats.

PS: According to a recent AlterNet article entitled "Game Over for Planet Earth," we're all gonna be fried like fish in a skillet first before we even get a chance to freeze to death or drown.

AlterNet says, "[Here's a] prediction offered by Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency: Without an effective international agreement to staunch greenhouse gases within five years, the door will close on preventing a potentially disastrous rise in the planet’s temperature." http://www.alternet.org/economy/153092/game_over_for_planet_earth%3A_the_month%E2%80%99s_biggest_story_you_never_read

PPS: Madam Jane's ominous-sounding and doom-like claim that irreversible climate change is only five years away is actually erroneous. And AlterNet's five-year claim is wrong too. According to the Christian Science Monitor, irreversible climate change is already here.

"Even if all the world's smokestacks and tailpipes were to suddenly stop spewing CO2, if all the trees everywhere were to be left standing, and if all the remaining coal, oil, and gas were to stay in the ground [and the American war-machine would suddenly stop spewing CO2 like there's no tomorrow as well], the planet would still be feeling the effects of global warming a millennium from now." http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/Bright-Green/2009/0127/report-calls-climate-change-irreversible

PPPS: How can we keep cheering on American wars abroad -- without bringing those wars back home to us too, like the recent violent shootings in Oakland and the recent pepper-spraying at U.C. Davis?

My Christmas shopping may just have to wait.

EXTRA! EXTRA! Madam Jane also predicts that the "American war" on Iran is about to happen too!

Remember back when, long before the war on Iraq was declared, millions of tons of war material was being amassed at various East Coast military bases here in the U.S.? Well, Madam Jane states that they are at it again. "Long endless lines of container trucks are currently pouring into supply depots all over the East Coast." Oops.

Plus America's bottom-kissing "yellow journalism" media is already geared up to make Iran look like the ultimate bad guy -- just as it did right before Bush's illegal invasion of Iraq.

And not only that but, according to Middle East specialist David Pratt, the video game Battlefield 3 has just come out with a brand new version -- starring good old Iran as the penultimate evil villain. It just doesn't get any more "War Profiteers Gone Crazy" than that! http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/david-pratt/demonisation-of-iran-carries-a-whiff-of-war-1.1137797?18451

And when Iran does get attacked, just THINK of all the air pollution that will be released! Good grief. Then Battlefield 3 will have to put out an even newer version -- featuring deadly hand-to-hand combat with radioactive smog.

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2011-11-27T09:26:00.000-08:00

Santa's Claws: How OWS is being drowned in a bathtub

My friend Michael's nephew Jake has been camping at Liberty Park since Occupy Wall Street's inception -- and now Jake has pneumonia.

American heroes like Jake should be appearing on Letterman and leading the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade and throwing out the first ball at Yankee Stadium and guest-starring on CSI New York and feted everywhere as the American heroes that they are.

Jake should be invited to dinner at the White House!

For standing up for the American people against the evil empire of corporatocracy that now runs our country, Jake has become another Paul Revere, another Nathan Hale, another Patrick Henry, another Benjamin Franklin. But instead the media is treating him like he was another Aaron Burr.

Jake -- and other valiant young people like him who are still holding out at Zucotti Park -- are the absolute cream of America's next generation and are endangering their very lives in order to save America from the corporatist Grinches who now own us lock, stock and Black Friday -- but instead of becoming national heroes, the rest of America merely stands by while Wall Street shows its horrible red claws and tries to drown these young heroes of the OWS movement in a bathtub -- just like it has tried to drown our economy, our liberty, our morals and our democracy as well.

There will be no presents under Jake's tree in Liberty Park this year, only pneumonia, danger and scorn -- unless all the rest of us Americans finally wake up, begin to actually fight for our country despite what the mainstream media is telling us, become more like Santa and start bearing gifts down to Jake and the rest of our new young national heroes bravely holding out at Zucotti Park -- starting with bringing long underwear, chicken soup and penicillin!

Give us Liberty -- or give us Wall Street -- for Christmas. We can't have both.

PS: Within the week, I expect to see Jake on TV reading Letterman's top-ten list of things that Americans must do in order rescue democracy back from the evil bloody claws of Wall Street.

PPS: Occupy Oakland is setting up occupations in front of various foreclosed homes there -- bringing the spirit of Christmas back to families victimized by Wall Street loan sharks. http://berkeleydailyplanet.com/issue/2011-11-20/article/38886?headline=Occupy-Oakland-Protesters-Set-Up-Camp-on-Lawn-of-Foreclosed-Home--By-Bay-City-News

I think that both Santa Claus and the sacred Baby whose birthday Christmas honors would approve.

PPPS: The other day, knitters in Berkeley held a "knit-in" at Occupy Cal, knitting scarves and mittens that would help keep brave protesting students warm. So let's have a knit-in at Liberty Park as well! http://berkeleydailyplanet.com/issue/2011-11-26/article/38911?headline=-Knit-In-at-Occupy-Berkeley-Site-to-Make-Warm-Clothing-for-Protesters--By-Erika-Heidecker-BCN-

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2011-11-20T14:46:00.001-08:00

The new revolutionaries: Thank goodness for FaceBook!

A new revolution is taking place in America -- and it's all happening on FaceBook. Does anyone but me find that a little bit weird?

After I "friended" Leah on FB, she sent me a video of U.C. Davis police torturing non-violent college students with pepper spray just because the poor students didn't want their tuition to go up -- again http://boingboing.net/2011/11/18/police-pepper-spraying-arrest.html. And now the video's gone viral and everyone in the world can see how America treats its youth.

But who benefits most from state-supported higher education? Surprisingly, it isn't the students. It's the One Percent. Every year, corporatists get a whole new crop of shiny young geniuses to chew up and spit out -- hopeful young graduates just begging big corporations to allow them to work in brain-numbing gray-flannel-suit corporate sweatshops.

Instead of having to educate and train their own peons themselves, corporatists now let the state do it. And they let the state pay for that training too.

So I immediately "liked" and shared Leah's post.

"The One Percent just don't get it," I wrote back. "We have FaceBook (for now), so that all the evil secret stuff that corporatists could get away with 20 years ago is now being broadcast all over the world instantly -- showing these bad guys up for what they actually are: People with NO FaceBook friends."

Go FaceBook!

Then I got a link from my FB friend Romi -- about Rep. Ted Deutch's proposed new Constitutional amendment that would eliminate corporatist personhood. http://deutch.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=269672 And here's my FaceBook reply to Romi's post:

"This could be the most important Constitutional amendment ever proposed since we eliminated slavery and gave women the vote! At the NY stock exchange, they have the GALL to fly an American flag. But then why not? They own America lock, stock and barrel. Your kids won't get a college education. Their kids will."

Then my FaceBook friend Saeed sent me an eye-witness video of the insane brutality that Israeli corporatists' occupation forces perpetuate in Palestine -- reminding me that our American college students could be treated that way too if we don't watch out.

Oops, too late. They already are.

Saeed wrote on his News Feed, "Four demonstrators got shot in Ni'lin Village. The Israeli army used live bullets against non-violent demonstrators, and even before the demonstrators reached the apartheid wall, the army started shooting and suppressing the demo. Many demonstrators suffered a lot as a result of inhaling the tear gas too." Here's Saeed's video, also now viral: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcTmmqQN7Vs.

Does that remind you of UC Davis? Or UC Berkeley? Or Kent State? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GI7-m919ynU (From Larry -- Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young singing about the four dead in Ohio, "soldiers are hunting us down...we're finally on our own," will bring tears to your eyes!)

Don't you just love FaceBook?

On FB, you get real eye-witness news the moment that it happens -- not that boiled down, censored crap that you get on TV.

I wonder how long FB will last before most of us real Americans, most of us 99%, will become "un-friended" by the corporatists. Mark Zuckerberg, this could be your moment to either be a patriot or a poodle. Be careful how you chose.

And next comes my post about the current labor movement in America: "Have you noticed that mostly the old and the young are coming out for Occupy America demonstrations? Could that be because America's biggest employers, the coproratists, are holding the rest of us -- afraid of losing our jobs and overwhelmed by credit-card debt -- by the, er, short hairs?

"I went to a labor union rally the other day and was almost the youngest person in the room. Shocking! I also heard four heroic ILWU longshoremen from Longview, Washington speak. Those guys were fearless -- they went after their corporatist masters with baseball bats! Wow. Here's some history and context of EGB's attempt to take over our grain export trade: http://www.longshoreshippingnews.com/2011/09/robert-mcellrath-ilwu-international-president-we-will-not-permit-egt-to-undermine-the-grain-export-industry/

"And there are also plans afoot to shut down all west-coast ports on December 6. Good. Let's see how long America can last without its heroin-like addiction to foreign goods.

"PS: I'm old now -- but not dead. Those longshoremen were cute!"

Then my friend Kristin wrote on FaceBook: "There are people, with tents, camping in front of Best Buy in Encino Hills right now for Black Friday. Camping. On. Cement. For. Days. Wow."

"Isn't anybody gonna pepper spray those people?" Ross C. replied.

And then I wrote this comment on my wall on November 22, a day that will live in infamy forever in my mind: "WHO KILLED JFK? Who had the means, the motive and the opportunity? Seriously? Kennedy's death marked the major beginning point for the brutal corporatist take-over of our government, our country and the planet."

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2011-11-18T10:04:00.000-08:00

Deja vu all over again: 1968 and 2011 on Sproul Plaza

Here I am, sitting on the steps in front of Sproul Hall at the University of California in Berkeley, looking out over Sproul Plaza before me, reliving my youth.

"Come to Cal and study city planning," my best friend Anne wrote me back in 1966. "President Johnson has just ear-marked hundreds of millions of dollars for urban renewal and for his Great Society, and there will be lots of city planning jobs available to us after we graduate. This is a good way to both help America and also have meaningful jobs."

Sounded good to me. I'd just finished helping Bill Tatum and Walter Thabit save New York City's Lower East Side from the bulldozer and I had nothing else to do. Cal, here I come!

Then what happened? I graduated from Cal in 1968 with an MCP -- only to be told by perspective employers, "Too bad for you. All the money that had been going to the Great Society is now going to the Vietnam war and most city planning jobs have been eliminated. And besides, we can't hire you because you're a woman -- we're only hiring men with families to support."

It was 1968. I had no money. No job. Nothing to do. So I just lived in a friend's attic, lived by my wits and sat on the steps in front of Sproul Hall every day for a year after my graduation. For a whole year.

It was a very bad year.

And now it's deja vu all over again. No job. No money. No hope. All the big hopes that we held for the new millennium in the year 2000 have all been wasted on stupid endless pointless wars on Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Palestine.

So I decided to do the same thing today that I had done back then: Go sit on the steps in front of Sproul Hall. Only this time I'm hoping that it won't take a whole other year for me to figure out what to do next.

PS: In many ways, the corporatist One Percent just loves our Occupy America movement -- because It gives the oligarchs who control us a chance to flex their weaponized muscles, to divide us American peons against each other still further and to characterize people who object to their wealth as dirty, homeless and crazy instead of moral and financial victims of their blatant systematic chicanery.

PPS: Nationally, the first thing that we 99% need to do is to eliminate the wide-spread massive corruption that currently characterizes American politics: http://maplight.org/us-congress/bill/112-s-1769/1020354/contributions-by-vote. Every politician who spends over $100,000 on any one campaign should be thrown in jail -- hopefully one of those private gruesome for-profit forced-labor-camp nightmare-inducing prisons that our current legislators have been shameless about voting into place.

Second, Anyone who has ever had anything major to do with the Federal Reserve should be jailed as well -- or tarred and feathered and run out of town on a rail. According to the GAO, the Fed just embezzled 16 trillion dollars from us and gave it to Wall Street and big American banks -- and to foreign banks too. http://www.silverbearcafe.com/private/10.11/gaoaudit.html) If that doesn't totally piss you off, then you need to start checking your pulse.

Third, unjust Supreme Court justices such as Thomas and Scalia should also be jailed immediately. And White House pretty-boy poodles for the One Percent such as Bush, Cheney and Obama should be jailed as well. And Congressional errand-boys for the big corporations? Also clamped in leg-irons! Duh.

Fourth, every single man, woman and child in America should also take turns sitting on Sproul Plaza for a day. And then we should all be awarded free education and/or meaningful jobs. Plus we should also be awarded $30,000 each -- as part of America's new victim compensation plan after having been viciously robbed by corporatist thieves in Washington and Wall Street.

PPPS: Speaking of bulldozers, U.C. police raided Sproul Plaza again at 3 am last night -- driving bulldozers across the plaza, flattening everything in sight, destroying tents and artwork in their wake and pushing people out of their way. No big surprise there.

PPPPS: And speaking of endless war, the Glasgow Sunday Herald's war correspondent David Pratt just sent me an article entitled "Danger: the Middle East may go Ballistic".

"In more than two decades of Middle East watching," stated Pratt, "I’ve got used to unexpected events and endless predictions of doomsday scenarios. But, even by its own politically volatile and labyrinthine standards, there have been some very ominous and shadowy things taking place there of late.... So many factors could now ignite the [Middle East right now], and standing well back would be a near impossible option for the international community. The Middle East might just be about to go ballistic, and I’m not simply talking about a few missiles in Iran." http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/david-pratt/danger-middle-east-may-yet-go-ballistic-1.1135570

Are we having fun yet?

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2011-11-16T11:23:00.000-08:00

Sacramento Street gets a make-over

While walking down to San Pablo Park to see my granddaughter Mena's school performance the other day, I couldn't help but notice that all of Sacramento Street was blocked. The entire street as far as the eye can see in both directions from the corner of Sacramento and Oregon was being torn up and re-paved. Like it was starring on America's Next Top Model or something, Sac Street was getting a fierce new make-over.

Then I walked up to Milvia Street and it was getting a make-over too. High time. Our infrastructure really needs it. While other cities in the Bay Area spend their time and money attacking people's First Amendment rights, the city of Berkeley fixes its streets!

And while 5,000-plus demonstrators are protesting tuition cuts at Cal Berkeley, Mena's pre-school is FREE. All education up to post-doc should be FREE too. Hear that, One Percent? Millions for militarized police forces and not one penny to help students. What does that tell you about America's priorities.

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2011-11-13T11:39:00.000-08:00

The height of Western Civilization: Economic chaos, climate disaster, pedophilia & drones?

Remember all the wonders of ancient Egypt, ancient Greece and ancient Rome, those amazing cradles of Western Civilization? Remember Shakespeare, Michelangelo, Newton, Copernicus and Einstein -- fathers of modern science, culture and art? Do the names Thomas Jefferson, Jesus Christ and Martin Luther King Jr ring a bell -- men who gave birth to our modern ideals regarding justice?

And what about Western Civilization's many miraculous offspring -- such as life-saving medicine, outstanding universities, electricity, the telephone, moving pictures, human beings landing on the moon, the airplane and central heating?

While babysitting my three-year-old granddaughter Mena the other day, I was suddenly overwhelmed by her wonderfulness. "I'm thinking that what you have produced here is probably the height of Western Civilization!" I exclaimed to my son Joe when he came to pick her up later. "Mena is smart, kind, positive, curious and creative. She's perfect."

And then I looked over at my son, who is the prime example of a perfect loving and caring father. "Oh hell, Joe, you are the height of Western Civilization too!"

I'm so proud to be a member of a society that can produce such outstanding, high-quality youth as these ones.

Sadly, however, what Western Civilization is really going to be the most remembered for among future historians -- if there will be any left, that is -- is going to be climate disaster, planet-wide radioactivity, an economic crisis of epic proportion, greedy and grubby leadership, grand-scale human subjugation, pedophilia and pornography, waterboarding, voting-machine fraud and the bloody and anonymous disfigurement and death of hundreds of thousands of innocent women and children by monstrous drones, gristly cluster bombs and nightmare-quality uranium-enhanced weaponry that maim and kill indiscriminately. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/uk-backs-bid-to-overturn-ban-on-cluster-bombs-6259139.html

Is it too late to change?

PS: When my daughter Ashley was in first grade back in 1994, I wrote a book that her class could read in preparation for their big spring camping trip up to Tilden Park. The moral of its story was that people learn by doing -- and that we are NOT stuck in our set ways forever but truly are able to change. (And also, perhaps, that if civilization as we know it is destroyed by our greedy and inept leaders, there's still a slim chance that we might still be able to survive by living off the land?) Anyway, here's my tale (illustrations are included below, free of charge):

Ms. Brown's First Grade Class and the Great Outdoors

Let's explore some of the facts we might know and the feelings we might have about city life. Let's then compare them with the facts we might know and the feelings we might have about the Great Outdoors.

Here's a fact: All the first graders in Ms. Brown's class know pretty much everything they need to know regarding the rules of city life. You all know how to flush a toilet, buckle a seat belt, brush your teeth, turn on a television, get dressed, get on and off a school bus, bicycle to the corner and turn on and off the kitchen light.

You know how to make a bowl of cereal. You know how to answer the telephone, how to open the door and how to eat your vegetables. You know when bedtime is. You know when to get up. You know where to put your boots away. You know where to find the ice cream section when you go to the grocery store.

You know who to tell when you see a bad guy. You know who to ask for help with your homework. You know what to do when you are at school. You know what to do when you are at home.

You know a lot about city life.

But what about feelings? Most of you feel at home in the city. Most of you feel pretty familiar and comfortable with the rules and ways of city life. Right? Right.

Here's a fact: There are no televisions, cars, lights, telephones, toilets, refrigerators, houses, bicycles, schools, streets or video games in the Great Outdoors. They don't even have Barney!

Life in the Great Outdoors is very different from life in the city.

There are a lot of fun things to do in the Great Outdoors, but they are fun in a different way than the fun things you find in a city. There is dirt in the Great Outdoors. Lots and lots of dirt. There are trees. There are creeks and rivers. There are bushes, plants and grass. There is lots and lots of fresh air.

There are almost no people. There is lots of room to run around in. There is a lot of silence and a lot of interesting sounds. There are animals and birds in the Great Outdoors. And the Great Outdoors has a whole new set of rules that are completely different from the rules of city life.

But what about feelings? You might not feel familiar with this new set of rules. You might wonder how you are going to learn all the new rules of the Great Outdoors. You might feel doubtful. You might feel scared. You might feel curious. You might even feel EXCITED by the chance to learn about a new way to survive successfully in a whole new place, to go to and beat a whole new level in the game of life!

Here's a fact: If you spend time learning about the Great Outdoors, you can learn a lot.

But what about feelings? Even if you only spend an hour or two a week learning about the Great Outdoors, sooner than you think you can learn enough to feel comfortable there -- to feel as much at home in the Great Outdoors as you do in the city.

(This book is dedicated to the memory of Ms. Denise Brown, teacher extraordinaire, the best teacher ev-ah)

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2011-11-09T22:18:00.000-08:00

"Some things never change": Student protests at UC Berkeley

On tonight's news, they featured various segments covering protests at Occupy Oakland, Occupy Los Angeles, Occupy Denver, Occupy Seattle, Occupy New York, Occupy Austin, Occupy Chicago, etc. And tonight I was also a part of "Occupy Cal". And the university police charged into a mass of student demonstrators like they were going after bank robbers or bad guys instead of just students protesting HUGE tuition hikes. And the students stood their ground on Sproul Plaza against great odds.

The police seized tents and banners from the students -- and what do you know? The students seized them right back! http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=buovLQ9qyWQ

And, later, when there was a lull in between various attacks on students, I had a chance to talk to some of the cops. "Are other local police forces involved in this operation -- or is it only the U.C. police?"

"Just the university police, ma'am. Not the city police. But the chancellor stated that he would not allow tents to be erected on campus." And so the chancellor apparently chose to give an order to take the tents down.

Bad choice.

"I used to protest here at this very same spot back in the 1960s," I then told the boys in blue.

"Some things never change," one cop replied. Well, guess what? Things had pretty damn well better change -- or else!

Or else what?

Or else there will be a hit-and-run type of protest movement from the rest of us 99% -- that will go on and on and on at different places daily all over America until things DO start to change. The corporatists don't have the money or the manpower to control all of us everywhere. A non-violent hit-and-run guerrilla protest movement? Yay.

And I just heard that U.C. Santa Cruz students have also gone out on strike.

And will a plaza or university or town square or bank near you be next?

PS: U.C. students in Berkeley are very well-represented by their district's councilperson, Kriss Worthington, who was also on Sproul Plaza, backing his young constituents up. Here's what he told the Berkeley Daily Planet tonight:

"At the home of the Free Speech Movement, the UCPD appears to have suppressed Free Speech again! Please join us in questioning this behavior and challenge the UCPD to respect the Free Speech Rights of Occupy Cal."

Worthington then went on to admonish Chancellor Birgeneau and UC police chief Calaya for their violent actions against non-violent protestors. "I wanted to bring to your attention that banners with Free Speech content appear to have been seized by UCPD in front of Sproul Plaza. ...It is hard to imagine that such an act could occur at the exact location in Berkeley where the Free Speech Movement began." Worthington nailed it exactly.

"You can imagine that the sense of irony will not be lost on the public, that the UCPD violated the Free Speech rights of protesters at this particular location. ...These students have made a firm commitment to no violence and no vandalism. The University should be commending the thousands of students that are participating. For many, this could be their very first political protest of their life. They are protesting specifically for additional financing for the University of California. The University should support this enthusiasm and help encourage this to be an effective protest that helps the University and our country."

http://www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/issue/2011-11-09/article/38766?headline=Open-Letter-to-Chancellor-Birgenau-and-Chief-Celaya-re-Free-Speech-on-Berkeley-Campus--By-Councimember-Kriss-Worthington

PPS: Of course it is unacceptable that police are violently shutting down freedom of speech at the very spot where the Berkeley Free Speech Movement was born. But even more unacceptable is the fact that free speech movements all over the United States are also being shut down -- here in America, in the Land of the Free.

I mean, seriously. With Veterans Day almost upon us, we can only speculate why our heroic troops fought and died in foreign wars -- if the very Freedom that they fought so hard for abroad is being violently shut down right here at home.

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2011-11-03T10:07:00.000-07:00

Occupy Berkeley: Urban homeless folk on the move

One surprising result of the new 99% movement has been that it has exposed, revealed and uncovered America's vast homeless population. "I've heard that in New York City, police are now instructing junkies, derelicts and the homeless to go down and live at Zuccotti Park," someone recently wrote on my FaceBook page wall.

Hell, these poor homeless slobs have to go somewhere.

Before the Occupy Wall Street movement came along, most of the destitute and homeless of America had been hidden away, living in invisible places where they wouldn't be noticed, hassled or jailed -- but now, suddenly, with the rise of OWS, it's now becoming cool to camp out.

As a result, we are now seeing America's homeless emerge out into OWS encampments, out from their secret hovels and hidey-holes and cardboard boxes under the freeways -- like rats coming out of a drain. America's rats. America's drains.

America's dark little secrets.

At Occupy Berkeley the other day, I counted 40 tents, 15 spiked-haired young runaways, 10 homeless veterans, eight toothless dopers and ten homeless dogs.

The Occupy America movement is making America's downtrodden underbelly of castoffs and misfits and detritus suddenly visible -- suddenly caught in the spotlight provided by free camping space.

Back in the 1960s, we had only one (1) homeless person -- living up on Telegraph Avenue during the daytime and in People's Park at night. Just one. Back then, Frankie was an anomaly, even for Berkeley. But now, as our schools, jobs, economy, infrastructure, healthcare system, Veterans Administration, senior programs, community networks, etc. all collapse around us as the money that used to fund them stops, changes direction and floods into the coffers of the rich instead, America will be creating more and more and more of this homeless jetsam and flotsam in years to come.

More and more of these socially-disposable prototypes are being created each day as schools fail to teach, jobs fly overseas, militias point the finger of blame on everyone but the banksters, lobbyists and war profiteers responsible, healthcare becomes unavailable to the working class, large numbers of returning vets suffer from untreated PTSD, the "War on Drugs" creates more and more criminals, gouging your neighbor becomes a way of life, Social Security and MediCare are threatened and the One Percent concentrates on creating World Domination for them instead of democracy for us.

More and more urban homeless folk are being created every single day -- and more and more of them are now on the move.

Will the next one be you?

PS: The dramatic new trend toward the militarization of America's police is turning out to be a war profiteer's wet dream. No longer do weapons manufacturers have to trudge off to far-away places on the other side of the globe in order to start wars and kill people so that they can sell their products. If they play their cards right, weapons manufacturers will now be able to start wars and kill people right here at home!

Or they can do both.

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2011-11-03T08:12:00.000-07:00

Black Bloc -- or Black Water?

The so-called Black Bloc that tried to disrupt Occupy Oakland on November 2, 2011, might not have been an anarchist group after all. After carefully studying a CBS News video of the Black Bloc's attack on Whole Foods http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/video/6413167-team-coverage-occupy-protesters-march-on-port-of-oakland/, there is one conclusion that is very easy to reach.

The Black Bloc looks and acts like a SWAT team.

The only question that remains is, "Whose SWAT team is it?" Hint: Not ours.

Perhaps "Black Bloc" is only a partially correct name for this group. Perhaps "Black Water" might be an even better moniker for them.

According to Global Research http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=19928, this wouldn't be the first time that agent provocateurs have been used at citizen protests against the nefarious One Percent. ''A union leader called out a group of 'black bloc anarchists' who were picking up rocks [at a Canadian demonstration in June 2010]. The real black bloc protesters were shouting 'POLICIER! POLICIER', the would-be-rock throwers got up and cozy with the cops in the hats and bats, and quickly got themselves 'arrested' (and treated very gently by the police I might add.' Turns out they were wearing the same brand of boot that the riot cops were wearing.''

"But, Jane, you're just being paranoid," you might say. Nah. We already know that these One Percent dudes are capable of doing ANYTHING to win. Fix elections, bomb countries, support dictators, steal from the Middle Class, plunder pensions, assassinate democratic heads of state, rig the stock market.... Why would they bother to start playing by the rules now?

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2011-11-01T11:27:00.000-07:00

Visiting Vancouver: Asian fusion & marijuana dispensaries

My granddaughter Mena is a sixth-generation Undocumented American. Her great-great-great grandfather came over to California from China for the gold rush and stayed on to help build the transcontinental railroad. But then, back in the 19th century, EVERYBODY in California was an Undocumented American. And, today in Vancouver, I also learned about documented and undocumented Canadians as well. And also about documented and undocumented marijuana users.

Vancouver is a magnificent "Jewel of the Pacific" type of city in the grand old tradition of Shanghai, Valparaiso, San Francisco and Sydney -- built overlooking water, it has an interesting history, a cosmopolitan population and lots of trees. Vancouver is a beautiful city -- with an element of Asian-fusion to it that also makes it interesting, exotic and chic.

At Vancouver's exquisite Sun Yat-Sen Classical Garden, I learned a lot about ancient China. First I learned that scholars were highly regarded there back in the day.

"The most highly-honored class of people in ancient China were its scholars," commented a museum docent. "And next in order were its farmers." Did I hear that right? Somebody actually honored farmers way back when? They must have been referring to some ancient Chinese agribusiness CEOs. Nobody I know of has ever honored mere farmers, the people who feed us each day.

"The third category to be honored were the artisans." Apparently arts and crafts were really big in old-school China. And apparently the last, least important category of importance in bygone China days were the corporatists.

In ancient China, however, this four-tier categorization obviously didn't work out so well over the long run -- but at least they tried. Here in America, a country that is supposed to be a democracy, corporatists are obviously kings -- and 99% of us know how badly that arrangement is working out.

Next, I learned that every Chinese scholar's garden must have four basic ingredients -- a building, a plum tree, a pine tree and some bamboo. "But what about Feng Shui," I asked the docent. The four principles essential to having good Feng Shui (usually translated as "harmony") in one's life are safety, beauty, organization and comfort. "This scholar's garden is certainly beautiful and safe and definitely organized -- but is it comfortable?" I asked. Would I just want to flop down, kick off my shoes and watch television here? Not.

"The comfort that scholars got from their garden was in its beauty," replied the docent. Oh.

I also learned that in modern-day Vancouver, 25% of its population is between the ages of 18 and 25 -- because students from all over Asia come here to study English. "And just before Hong Kong was taken over by mainland China in 1997, many Hong Kong residents moved here and bought condos in downtown Vancouver," There is also a large Japanese and Tibetan presence here, giving this city a real feeling of Asian-fusion, cultural diversity and Pacific Rim internationalism.

Next I went off to Vancouver's large Granville Island farmers' market to honor some farmers by buying a peach.

By now I've been traveling for over 2,200 miles and my knees and right ankle were really hurting, forcing me to forgo visiting the famous Capilano suspension bridge's cliff walk and tree house. "Why don't you try some medical marijuana to ease the pain?" someone then suggested. Medical marijuana is legal in Vancouver? They don't have drug cartels and drug lords running it up from Mexico with AK-47s like they do in the States?

"Of course it's legal here. We are a civilized nation." Except, perhaps, for Steven Harper -- Canada's answer to folks like Bush and Reagan and Obama and Blair.

So off I went to a doctor and showed him a medical report on my knees and ankle, and also showed him my nifty blue handicap sticker which I love so much that I'm thinking of having it tattooed on my arm. Then the doctor asked me a few questions like, "How did you get injured?" So I told him about falling down some stairs in the Peace Corps in South Africa back in 2007. And then, after asking me about how easy it would be for older people to join the Peace Corps (pretty easy), he signed a paper saying I needed marijuana to ease the pain, and I was good to go.

Next on my tourist agenda is going to be a trip to a marijuana dispensary. Should I do this? Will it help? Is medical marijuana expensive? Will it make a good souvenir? I'm about to find out!

PS: Speaking of Feng Shui, I just gotta mention that the corporatists who currently control both the government and the economy back in the States have not created any beauty or comfort or safety or organization in America (nor any democracy either). American corporatists have bad Feng Shui!

Let's do something about that.

Perhaps we also need to occupy Congress, the White House and the Supreme Court as well as Wall Street -- in order to bring good Feng Shui back into our lives.

What a great slogan to chant that would be. "Beauty! Comfort! Organization! Safety!"

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