The following is an update from Suzanne Taylor and TheConversation.org Making Sense of These Times [http://www.theconversation.org] Website. Thank you for your interest. If you wish to be removed from this list at any time, just let us know.________________________________________June 1, 2002CROP CIRCLE DIARY ENTRIES:New Conversation:Walter Starck writes to us about our upcoming film [http://www.mightycompanions.org/cropcircles/conversation.html#walters].
Suzanne's comments: This is the kind of conversation that makes my heart soar. An outstanding person "gets it," from seeing our movie materials, about crop circles -- just what we hope the film will do for everyone. Some quotes from Walter Stark [http://www.goldendolphin.com]:
Yesterday I read about Crop Circles: Quest For Truth [http://www.mightycompanions.org/cropcircles/gazeckispeaks.html]. As I read the piece [by director, William Gazecki], I began to feel something of the wonder, discovery and elation you describe in experiencing the actual phenomena...
Although the circles themselves are truly remarkable and inexplicable within the limits of our currently prevailing concept of reality; the human reaction to them is in some ways even more remarkable...There is nothing to indicate the circles are manmade nor even any conceivable way one might make them overnight, repeatedly, in various places all over the world, undetected and without trace...Inexplicable happenings that make people feel good is no story. A hoax accompanied by a bit of conflict and aggression is more what they are prone to report.
What really counts is the phenomena itself and especially its effect on and clear linkage with our own consciousness...it clearly has profound implications for our understanding of the real nature of our own being.
...they may be saying we are almost there; if we clean up our act, stop acting like juvenile brats and become worth knowing we may be invited to join the club. The reason SETI isn't finding a cacophony of intelligent transmissions and the solar system isn't overrun with vastly old and unimaginably advanced civilizations must be because vastly older and unimaginably more advanced civilizations than our own must not behave anything like we do.
Conquering, occupying, dominating, and controlling are only imperatives for the fearful. Discovering, fostering, and sharing are much more enjoyable.Glickman on the radio:Michael Glickman, one of my favorite crop circle pundits, who is the most imaginative and knowledgeable researcher about certain mathematical aspects of the phenomenon, will be live on "Dreamland" with Whitley Streiber, tonight (Saturday, June 1) in the U.S., 6-8 pm PST (if it's live in England, it would be 2 am to 4 am Sunday). If you miss the live broadcast, you can catch an archive, for 4 weeks at: : http://www.live365.com/stations/288830?site=walkercollier.________________________________________COLUMN FROM GEOV PARRISH: Feeling unregulated? Public drowning in shower of dropping shoes -- May 29, 2002Suzanne's comments: A big picture piece about corporate corruption -- add it all up here, re who and what on the bankruptcy front. What a world, where deregulation, instead of creating healthy competition, led to avaricious abuse. "When, last month, federal regulators released correspondence between Enron lawyers and executives that detailed a stunning variety of predatory practices, those documents also included a number of claims that, in effect, 'everybody's doing it' — that is, that Enron's major competitors (including Duke Energy, Dynegy, the Williams Companies, Mirant, and Calpine) were engaging in the same sort of price manipulation."Other quotes drawn from the column:For anyone interested in learning about the seamy underside of global capitalism, skip the front section of your paper and head to the business pages. There, corporate fraud and crime are actually reported — not, alas, with any kind of an eye toward the impact upon its victims or society, but in terms of how it might affect stock value...
It's no coincidence that so many of these large, Enron-style debacles involving shady accounting practices, market manipulation, and victimization of both investors and consumers, are coming in recently deregulated industries...
Young ghetto kids these days are getting life sentences for stealing ballpoint pens or medicating themselves, but a multi-billion dollar scam — when taxpayers are picking up the bill and the company evades taxes entirely — is considered no big deal outside the stock exchanges.COLUMN FROM GEOV PARRISH: Colombia on the Verge: The next crisis is here -- May 28, 2002Suzanne's comments: It is so disheartening to take in the scope of what our tax dollars are funding. Read this and weep about the victory of a far right extremist in Columbia's presidential election, and what tragedy that bodes for that country and ours. "The talk in Bogota these days is of a 50-year cycle of tragedy and how the United States is not only walking right into it, but encouraging it...A dramatic escalation in Colombia's war is upon us and, in both Bogota and Washington, the expectation is that the United States will be a full partner...For years observers have been warning that Colombia could explode, with the United States caught in the explosion. By all accounts, that crisis is finally here."Other quotes drawn from the column:...the last time Colombia elected an extremist like Uribe in 1950, the resulting dictatorship killed 150,000 people in three years before a coup deposed it. On the prior occasion in 1898, the result was the "Thousand Days' War," with 100,000 massacred.
Colombia already has the hemisphere's worst human rights record...And now Colombia has elected as its president a man who first came to national prominence a decade ago, encouraging the growth of "self-defense groups" — paramilitary vigilantes of the sort associated with 80% of Colombia's human rights abuses.
...the United States has now clearly cast its lot with the continent's most violent regime in a war it cannot win. Moreover, virtually nobody in the United States seems to have noticed, or cared.________________________________________COLUMN FROM ARIANNA HUFFINGTON: Why Is Washington Ignoring The Warning Signs Of Economic Devastation? -- May 30, 2002
Full column: http://www.ariannaonline.com/columns/files/053002.htmlSuzanne's comments: I don't know how Arianna is so knowledgeable, but we are fortunate that she has the capacity to make such a detailed compilation of the elements that go into "corporate scumbags undermining the modern private enterprise system." "'It is unlikely,' Sen. Jon Corzine, a Banking Committee member championing reform, said this week, 'that we will get strong reform unless there is a new event that captures the public imagination.' You mean the largest corporate bankruptcy in history and the parade of corruption that has followed weren't big enough?... Do we have to wait for another 433 companies to go belly up, and two million more Americans to lose their jobs, before our leaders heed the warning signals and make passing the post-Enron reforms a top priority?"Other quotes drawn from the column:It's a textbook case of special interests triumphing over the public interest...the same folks who helped bring us this mess by relentlessly chipping away at the rules and regulations governing their industries are now ensuring that any efforts to clean things up will be thwarted. And lest we forget, the problem is that much of what is being done isn't illegal but should be. Otherwise, the manic appetite for profits will continue to inspire Wall Street's rats to squeeze through every loophole.________________________________________OTHER ADDITIONS TO OUR QUOTES SECTION [http://www.theconversation.org/index.html#quotes]:What a sad place New York City has become...the narrowness of public discussion, not just on Israeli-Palestinian issues, but also on the threatened American attack on Iraq and the administration's war on terrorism in general.
... universities are the only place for political discussion these days. "I hear there was a fantastic debate at Yale Law School recently," my highly placed Bush appointee reported. "Two Palestinian law students wiped the floor with Tom Friedman, the New York Times columnist."
The fascination, and frustration, of America has always been the way one society can produce so much optimistic vigour and risk-taking intellectual energy alongside a ruling culture of such boorish ignorance and cruelty.
New York is starting to feel like Brezhnev's Moscow: Public debate in America has now become a question of loyalty
Jonathan Steele
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4414414,00.htmlThe American president Bill Clinton, with the most famous scandal regarding women, was in love with the childish Jewess Madeleine Albright, the secretary of state. He would make no decision without getting the approval of this woman, who became notorious for her short garments that often caused embarrassment when she met political dignitaries.
The American Snake
Kamal Sa'ad, a columnist for the Egyptian opposition weekly Al-Usbu
http://www.memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SD38502________________________________________FIVE STAR PIECE: "Bowling for Columbine" Wins Cannes Prize, Michael Moore -- May 27, 2002Full Piece: http://www.theconversation.org/moorecannes.htmlSuzanne's comment: Thank God for some good news. Michael Moore, whose "Stupid White Men" has topped best seller lists for 15 weeks, has done it again in terms of popular appeal for a pull no punches anti-Bush stance, this time with a film documentary. It will thrill you to read this -- a good antidote to the rest of the news. "...my new film, 'Bowling for Columbine,' was awarded the Special Prize of the 55th Cannes Film Festival. It had already made history by being the first documentary chosen to be part of the official festival competition in almost 50 years. And, last night, it was the only prize awarded that received a unanimous decision from the festival jury...the standing ovation our film received as the credits rolled set a new record in the history of the Cannes Film Festival -- 13 minutes long. ."Other quotes drawn from the piece:..."Bowling for Columbine" winning "Best Film" from a vote of hundreds of French teachers and students from around the country who each year come to Cannes and award one movie their "Cannes Prix Educational National." It's the only "people's prize" at Cannes where everyday citizens get to screen the films and vote...
"Bowling for Columbine" is a provocative, controversial film that is going to make a lot of people angry. That is not my intention. I do not relish the hassle I am in for. But the work I do must be an honest expression of what I see and believe...
"Bowling for Columbine" is my personal view of America at the turn of this new century. It is not specifically about Columbine and, no, it is not about bowling. My favorite quote I read during the festival was, "This film will single-handedly guarantee that George W. Bush will never see a second term." Well, one can only dream. After all, it is just a movie. If it go as planned, the film will be released in October.________________________________________NOTEWORTHY NEWS: Transcript of Paula Zahn Interview with Noam Chomsky and Bill Bennett -- May 30, 2002Full Transcript: http://www.theconversation.org/cnntranscript.htmlSuzanne's comments: Noam Chomsky's anti-war international bestseller, "9-11," is a subject of debate in mainstream media. Following controversial feature articles in the "New York Times" and "Washington Post" earlier this month, arch-conservative William Bennett proposed on Paula Zahn's CNN morning show that he and Chomsky debate. The debate was live on May 30. How transparently Bennett argues, without being responsive to what Chomsky says. There is something incredibly satisfying in Chomsky not letting Bennett get away with anything.BENNETT: Go through the Chomsky work, line by line, argument by argument, and you will see this is a man who has made a career out of hating America and out of trashing the record of this country. Of course, there is a mixed record in this country. Why do you choose to live in this terrorist nation, Mr. Chomsky?
CHOMSKY: I don't. I choose to live in what I think is the greatest country in the world, which is committing horrendous terrorist acts and should stop.________________________________________COMMENTS FROM OUR LISTMEMBERS:Jim Dreaver [http://www.jimdreaver.com], author of The Way of Harmony, writes:
I appreciate your perspective, though I still believe we need to militarily hammer the terrorists, don't give 'em an inch to breathe. Al Qaeda and their ilk are ALREADY committed to our destruction, regardless of whether we retaliate or not. If we don't fight back, it will just make it easier for them to achieve their Hitlerian goals. Honor the idealist, peace-loving view, yes, but at the same time let's not forget who we are dealing with here.
I visited the crop circle pictures... I don't know how they got there but they sure are beautiful!Suzanne responds:The argument isn't against the use of force, but that a war is different from a criminal action. We are in a perpetual, unwinnable war, hurting people wholesale, instead of an operation that would target guilty persons. If you disagree, what military deployment do you support?
Nobody knows how the crop circles got there -- the only thing we know is that it's not us!!!
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