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Category: Politics and Government

Be Sad About Yet Another Mass Shooting. But STAY MAD and Take Action

May 27, 2022

Please find below a link (to PBS Newshour) that lists what every US senator proposes and “plans to do” to attempt to stop gun violence in America. Although not every senator has a plan — many didn’t even respond — it is a helpful launching pad to learn more about all the various Bills and proposals already out there to address this crisis.

I am 100% with you brother. I too grew up with our dad (retired naval officer, after two tours in Vietnam) taking us out to teach us gun safety and how to shoot every summer. Although it never grabbed me as a hobby, as it did with my brother, I have always appreciated the safety they provide one’s house and family.

With that said, that puts me a bit at odds with the second amendment… Because I see owning a gun as an imperative tool for a man or woman to protect themselves and their loved ones. (I admit i would feel unsafe for my family without a gun in the home.)

And I also appreciate those who want to go to ranges and practice and become an expert at shooting as an occupation or hobby. And even those who enjoy shooting as a sport. It is an actual sport. I get it. I’m not against those things.

(Although I must admit I feel morally inclined to be against humans “hunting” animals for sport. But that’s just me. It doesn’t make me “right”. Just my subjective viewpoint.)

But that’s where it ends with me. I think we’ve gone way too far, overboard. And if we started a massive project to destroy 99% of the guns in the country as other nations have done, then maybe I wouldn’t feel such a strong need to own a gun to feel safe.

It seems to me we have allowed our capitalist and political system to take way too much advantage of “the second amendment” and the more vulnerable people among us. To the point where guns and weapons are a hugely profitable business that nobody wants to give up, and because of it we have a legal system set up now so locked up in centuries of red tape and bureaucracy geared towards “free and easy guns for any and every one” to support that profit machine that it seems almost impossible to the average person to ever solve the crisis it’s created.

So everybody utters “thoughts and prayers” and expresses their sadness and grief, and then we move on. Because most feel completely victimized and immobilized by the apparent impossibility of solving the problem. It’s not that most Americans want free and easy guns floating all over the country. But we’re all aware that the industry is so big that 50-75% of elected civil servants need to accept the money in one form or another offered them from lobbyists representing “guns” and “the sacred second amendment”. Just as they do from every other industry lobbyist.

Hence the vital need for campaign finance reform in the US. That lobbyist system, forced upon us without our consent approval or desire for it, literally breeds the corruption and deceit we witness daily in American politics by (I believe) a few otherwise potentially moral people. But in the US civil servants aren’t elected because they’re good at their job or could be. They’re elected because they raised the most money. They have no choice. They know it. We know it. Because again, we feel trapped by and see no way out of yet another system we had no part in and no choice in its establishment, nor its continuance. We are enslaved by it.

Weekly mass shootings and the proliferation of more guns than American citizens in our country is just one of the countless atrocities we are forced to endure due to a corrupt and broken system deliberately created and perpetuated by greedy soulless monsters who were here long before us and are now gone. And yet there are plenty serving today who still wish to perpetuate this insanity.

I know we are all heartbroken and in shock over yet another mass shorting. But i would urge us all to not even allow ourselves to get any relief out of feeling sad or utter “thoughts and prayers” and instead keep the anger and fire alive inside of us in order to force us to take ACTIONS.

Because the only way we are going to solve THIS is the same way we always have, like ending slavery, or getting women the right to vote, or ending horrendous wars or stopping over zealous police from needlessly murdering black people. We have to refuse now to accept this ever happening again.

And we will do just that as soon as we recognize that there are way more of us than them, as soon as we take to the streets, start boycotting, civil disobedience, advertising campaigns, marches and rallies, international cooperatives that boycott and ban any companies responsible for being a part of the gun trade directly or indirectly, heckling and harassing both online and in person and at rallies every single politician who dares to open their mouths in support of continuing this madness. If we can do it with MeToo, then we can do it with murdering people.

(See how confused and distracted they have us with talk and discussion about “the second amendment” and bills and proposals and legislation…? We’re actually discussing if it’s even possible for our elected leaders to stop “murdering people” from being a daily part of our lives!!! We’ve become indoctrinated to believe that it’s an impossible task, that years need to be invested into “investigating how to prevent it” because we love and need our guns and we “have a right to them”. It’s mass psychosis.)

We need to make the elected and non elected leaders of this country finally come to terms with the fact that as a people we are DONE with this. We are done with them.

It has to be a MISSION. A full on peoples movement that doesn’t stop until we win.

What does winning mean exactly? Well the PBS article we read today does an excellent job of spelling it out. All the action items and bills that need to become laws are right there. No investigation needed.

I hate To say it, but this needs to get to the point where if a politician or even a neighbor or a friend or family member mentions something about “not wanting gun control” or wanting to “maintain their right to buy as many guns as they want to”, THAT needs to be treated as badly and punitively as uttering a racial slur or committing a hate crime or sexual abuse or any of the other things we have deemed as a society are no longer appropriate, desired or permitted in civil society. The time for patience and discussion is over.

We would never allow someone in todays world to say “faggot” or the N word. But we still let people waffle on gun control laws? Background checks? Licensing? All the while knowing that another mass shooting is around the corner because of this stalling tactic? All in the name of needing more time to debate or investigate.. or respect those who “want their rights”? Because it’s “in the constitution”..? That’s the same thing they said about slavery. Or about Native Americans. Or about women. The constitution was filled with downright barbarous monstrous things. And we endured that sh*t for hundreds of years. Those days are over now for the legal gun running disguised as “business” that causes the endless shameful parade of mass shootings we are forced to endure every week in the US.

We need to make examples of every single person who still doesn’t get it. Immediately. In the moment. Just as we did in support of our LGBTQ friends. At some point we decided to stop debating and pandering and enduring, realizing those on the other side were either too old or too dumb or too heartless to get it and they never would. So we took action. We need to do that again now. Be sad, sure. But GET MAD. And stay mad. And let’s end this once and for all.

  • https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/what-action-should-be-taken-on-guns-we-asked-every-senator

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Activism, Current Events, Politics and Government Buffalo, campaign finance reform, gun control, gun lobby, lobbying, new york, NRA, NY, second amendment, TX, uvalde

There Will Be No Impeachment, But There Should Be

February 12, 2021

Well there it is. Trump defense attorneys were well prepared and just made incredibly valid points supporting their claim that he should not be impeached by the senate for the capital siege. They are in the process of presenting countless examples of extremist calls for violence and uprisings by people on the left as a means to justify and defend Trump’s words and actions.
The unfortunate result will be a stalemate that leaves America ever more prone and vulnerable to further violence as the people on both sides fight amongst themselves for some kind of middle ground.
As someone who’s been in the center of large marches and protests all over the country for the last 25 years I will freely admit that yes we were always aware that we were primarily comprised of people either on the left or staunchly independent — it never occurred to us that Republicans would take to the streets. Activism and grass roots movements seemed to always belong to the radical left. It was a given. Taken for granted.
And though we never participated in any kind of violence or vandalism we were always keenly aware those activities followed grassroots movements around. We witnessed it constantly and always tried to dissuade others from doing it.
Yes the BLM movement was often punctuated by incessant violence throughout the summer. I personally expressed concern repeatedly on social media about us having to fall asleep to the sound of bombs and gunshots all night for months in NYC, and witnessed three men gun down another in the street right in front of me. A surreal and traumatizing event. Posted it to Instagram. Didn’t feel like it helped our mission.
After two and half decades active in mass change movements I have almost come to expect and accept that a little bit of violence and vandalism is a natural part of the path towards massive sociopolitical change in our culture.
Do I feel differently now that those on the right have suddenly woken up to discover the value of activism? Let me answer it this way: mid-summer I was so frustrated by and pissed off at elected officials on both sides of the aisle for not doing anything to pass stimulus quicker for the millions of Americans who were hurting, while corporations were receiving billions of aid, that I seriousky considered promoting a campaign of mass vandalism of banks, financial institutions and governmental buildings. I would be the first to do it to inspire others.
But before I acted I reached out to several trusted friends to ask them what they thought of my plan. They all encouraged me to NOT do it. They said I could achieve the same results and help express peoples’ discontent through cooler less violent means. More aligned with The Ambassador. So I didnt proceed. Looking back I am grateful for those friends and their sage advice.
And that’s where I come down in regards to the Right’s sudden discovery of street activism. Activists are notoriously smart. Intimidatingly so usually. I can tell you that personally from experience. They’re well read on the issues and well informed.
There were and are two distinct groups active for Black Lives Matter: one was the initial emotional RE-action of the mob, highlighted by quick impulses to commit violence vandalism and mayhem, a phenomenon we often see whenever humanity encounters events that are shocking and atrocious. The other was the more subdued and rational but resolute actions in the streets by the majority who chose to peacefully march chant and carry signs for months everyday to get the basic message across: Black Lives Matter.
The problem with the Trump supporters’ sudden foray into activism were multifold: what they were protesting was a lie. There was no stolen election. There was no underlying issue they were fighting for. They had been deceived and they hadn’t taken the time to research the issue itself. Secondly, their initial response was a primitive irrational and emotional rush to violence which ultimately killed 6 people.
Behind every street protest you see there is always a compound of insanely intelligent folks in rooms working the research, the phones, communicating with the media, honing and steering the message and the ship at large. They inform how those in the street act and what they do. They give intelligent data and direction to the people in the streets so it’s not just unplugged emotion and pandemonium.
The mob that stormed the capital on January 6th had no inteligencia posted in a room guiding them or giving them direction. If they had they wouldn’t have stormed the capital. They would have understood like the majority of Americans that there was no underlying issue to protest. They also would have chosen a safer, less violent, more intelligent and compassionate and more creative manner to express their dissent (had their dissent been in any way justifiable, which it wasn’t.)
Consider for a moment the massive Women’s Marches and Anti-Trump Marches we witnessed the week after the Trump inauguration in 2017. Both Princess little tree and I were in those marches. We were millions strong. All over the United States. No one got hurt. The issue was valid. The message was clear — we support women, immigrants, Muslims, Latinos and the LGBTQ community and we object to Trump’s policies that deny their rights. The spectacle was creative. The events were peaceful.
The marches and protests and activism exhibited by pro-Trump supporters over the last four year’s have been consistently plagued by violence ugliness and an underlying xenophobic racist and homophobic tone. It’s undeniable. It doesn’t imply that all republicans share those views. But the onus is on every single Republican to shake loose the stain that Trump has left on the party by his refusal to reject or denounce the actions taken in his name by these groups of misguided thugs.
The GOP will never again garner the respect of Americans or the world if it does not take this action decisively. And until such time those of us who’ve been in the trenches of grassroots activism for years will always look upon any attempt at activism by those on the right with fear and trepidation.
The goal of activism is a noble goal. The mission is founded in purity of heart, compassion, peace, intelligence; it is well thought out and it never resorts to violence. Most importantly it has an underlying issue it supports that it believes is vital. It is not blind. It is not a mob. It is never waged behind the false and incoherent ramblings of a madman or a sore loser spewing lies.
Regarding the senate impeachment hearing of Donald Trump, at this point it doesn’t matter what we believe one way or the other. Their defense team’s arguments have been enough for senate members on the right to feel safe and justified to vote no to impeaching.
Truth is we’ve been heading down a road of more and more violence in the streets from both sides. Both sides feeling justified. And both sides are justified in feeling “horrified” by what they’ve seen by those who they perceive as being “the enemy”.
The problem America may face after these proceedings is a shared feeling of righteous justification to incite further violence and insurrection in the streets and against our elected leaders and governmental seats nationwide. This is the big risk Republican lawmakers face. Through their fear of retribution by Trump supporters in their own party and through their cowardly desire to maintain their seats of power, their no votes may be viewed as condoning the barbarous acts of January 6th, inflicting an increase of violence on American life in the months and years to come.
If you ask me I believe we just barely escaped the worst outcomes after the disturbing attempts made by radicals on the right to threaten the lives and homes of elected officials as they tried to reverse the election results. In my humble opinion things never would have veered so far astray had those on the right not been lied to repeatedly about a “stolen election” by the president, or if he hadn’t repeatedly encouraged such behavior or even if he would have just chosen at some point to talk his supporters down for the sake and safety of the country.
I am reminded of that rally in ‘08 when a McCain supporter yelled out “Obama is an Arab islamic terrorist!” and an obviously disturbed McCain nobly spoke up and reprimanded the man saying “Hey hey we don’t say those kinds of things. That’s not true. It’s not true.” I was so proud to be American in that moment.
Unfortunately for all of us Trump was never able to embody the integrity decency or nobility of John McCain. And because of that unfortunate fact his supporters and the GOP itself has lost all memory of those once cherished values. Fortunately, Joe Biden seems to be cut from the same cloth as McCain and is now displaying for us all how valuable those values are. He embodies them.
The problem is that Trump never stepped up to the role of president to decry or denounce the barbarous acts taken in his name on January 6th. Instead he looked upon them with glee and enthusiasm. He praised those who perpetrated them, going so far as saying he loved them. He never spoke up to defend the constitution or the democratic ideals that govern us by simply announcing that the results of the election appear in all manner to be legitimate and that he humbly accepts the loss and encourages his supporters to do the same. He never acknowledged that Joe Biden is now the president.
Because of these unfortunate facts we may be facing an unparalleled escalation of violence in the streets and against public officials by rightwing extremists who still believe the big lie that Trump has never taken back. I must admit I am fearful for our president, for our Speaker, for the former Vice President and for anyone on either side who doesn’t happen to side with Trump or his murderous band of extremist thugs.
It is also for the above reasons that I believe that a good case can be made for the senate to impeach Trump and be perfectly justified. Forget whether he instigated or incited the siege on our nations capital. The real crux of his unforgivable and treasonous transgressions is that he stood by and did nothing while his supporters perpetrated the crimes.

And he never once had the integrity honor or even patriotism of a valid president to denounce their heinous actions on that day. We would expect no less from a president. And yet he couldn’t find within him an ounce of that courage or moral fiber to do what we all not only expect but need as a nation. That’s reason enough to impeach and convict the man. As sad as it may be for all of us, it is vital and necessary.

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Activism, American Terrorism, Current Events, Human Rights, Politics and Government activism, Black Lives Matter, BLM, Impeachment, joe biden, john McCain, rightwing extremists, Trump

Death Man, Death. Death Is In, Death Is In

February 6, 2021

2 weeks ago we were down in Florida due to our dad passing away from the virus. Got home Monday and the next day we learned that our eldest cousin, my uncle’s firstborn, passed away suddenly. A few days later my buddy Stretch called me crying because he just learned his 30 year old nephew had died. A few days later our drummer Infinito learned that his mom had died from the virus down in Bolivia. We spoke this morning, both of us crying. He’s devastated. Justifiably so.
As I type all this it seems impossible that it can all be real. Denial. I’ve been sick with various maladies for a few weeks. Saw four different doctors this week. Hard to even keep track of the different things we’re talking to the doctors about. It’s occurred to me that this physical breakdown is probably due to the impossible task of trying to mentally and emotionally integrate this bombardment of tragedy and death everywhere.
One death overshadows the one before and so on. And then you come back to that prior one. And then back to the next one and the next. An endless cycle.
What I’ve been trying to do at a minimum is stay in touch with family and friends as much as possible to communicate with and support them through this hard time. Physically I’m down for the count. I think that’s part of the process. Mentally I’m in a foggy daze. Not even aure what I feel. I know what I’m supposed to feel. But it’s too much. Too heavy.
My brother texted me earlier and just wrote “horrible times man” about all of it. There’s a part of me that wants to acknowledge that. Hard to argue with it. Another part of me wants to believe that any minute we’re going to come out of it and everything is going to be great again. And admittedly things are “great” for some people; those who haven’t been touched in any way by the virus.
Though I do believe we were all traumatized if not permanently scarred by the surreal insanity and horror of the last four years we just came out of. For many of us we weren’t around for the tragedy and chaos of the 60s or vietnam or watergate etc. These were just stories we read about years later. We didn’t fully understand the deep seated trauma those years had on society or each person individually. It really wasn’t until the last few years that we had a personal experience of it ourselves.
That kind of shock and horror. A visceral experience. The way it kept builidng, each day worse than the last, going to bed each night and waking up everyday for years terrified of what we’d hear next from the White House. The way it continued to get worse and worse and culminated in a horrific tragic and terrifying ending on January 6th.
I’d like to report that the survival of the republic as evidenced by the surreal inauguration healed all the wounds inflected. Granted it was a relief. They tried hard. They did their best. We all did. But we’ll always look back at those weeks as a swirling mess of emotions. How could we not? We had just come out of the capital riots and mass deaths were still circling our day to day lives hourly.
As valiant an attempt as the inauguration tried to be — and it had many moments, it couldn’t, and shouldn’t, dispel the shock we had and have all lived through. A part of me feels that we owe it to ourselves and to those who passed to remember. To grieve. To mourn. To contemplate. Not forever perhaps. But definitely not cut it too short.
Frankly I’m not sure I’d be able to cut it short even if I wanted to. I’m trying to do what’s right. To feel what’s right. To be respectful of the near half a million of our fellow citizens who have died this past year.
And as well to honor the anger I feel toward the pansy-assed members of the GOP who didn’t have the courage or nobility to stand up for what’s right or sacred in our democracy. I miss guys like John McCain a lot. Mitt Romney comes to mind. Thank God for him. But we need more of them. It can’t just be 5 to 10 Republicans out of tens of millions who see things straight. What’s to stop it from happening again?
I can hear friends now advising me that I’m confusing and conflating the issues. This mass explosion of death all around us with the deeply divided politics destroying us from within. But it’s hard for me not to. Both events have deeply affected us. I’ll never dismissively ignore division or coups or civil wars in other countries again, as if “it’s not my business”.
Nor will I ever again take for granted the cooperative peace and unity we enjoy in the U.S. That’s something to cherish and work on maintaining. It’s a noble goal.
In my mind i keep hearing that scene from All That Jazz play… “Death man… death man… Death is in… death is in….” If we picture the Vietnam memorial in DC, as large and foreboding as it is, we’d need ten of those to honor the fallen of just the past year. None of us are getting away from that reality unscathed. Only the coldest and most heartless among us perhaps.
Don’t get me wrong. I want to. I’m beyond overwhelmed and over it like everyone else. People are now starting to talk about the coming “roaring 20s”… I find it hard to go there still being surrounded by so many passing. It feels disrespectful.
In Tenet, people from the future are willing to destroy everyone in the past in order to save themselves in the future. Part of me feels like that’s what we’re trying to do now… Sacrificially ignoring everyone who has stacked up in the afterlife in order to move on with all of us who are “still alive”.
But that may just be part of the grieving and integration process. I get that. I think it may come down to those who have lost someone and those who haven’t. At some point we do all have to move on. If we had any hard proof of an afterlife maybe we could pick and choose… But we don’t. So the only thing we do have is our innate instinct as organic life forms to keep going, here, in life. We owe it to them I suppose. Or not. I’m torn about that theory frankly. Again, probably part of the grieving process.
I guess what it comes down to for me is this deeply rooted feeling that we need to do our absolute best to honor those who passed this past 12 months.
We didn’t do a good job of it over the last year. Due to inept leadership we ignored and denied and dishonored our dead because it wasn’t “politically convenient”. It was the greatest shared national shame I’ve ever experienced since I’ve been alive.
Luckily that’s changed. But we still have work to do. We need to acknowledge our shared loss, name them in our hearts and out loud, remember them, honor them, recognize that it’s okay that we miss them and love them and mourn for them. And then eventually, hopefully, we can all heal.

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Alternative History, Current Events, Friends and Family, Personal Life, Politics and Government 2020, America, capital riots, coronavirus, COVID-19, Death, Donald Trump, honoring those who died, integrating loss, mourning the loss of loved ones, National shame, the passing of loved ones, Vietnam, watergate, White House

It’s Not Cancel Culture. It’s Course Correction. And It’s Been a Long Time Coming

February 3, 2021

There are a lot of legends and myths being promoted at the moment in America. For a variety of different reasons. All of them selfish and none of them helpful to the greater good. We have to be careful about what we hear and how we allow it to affect us. Often times the most popular “celebrities” aren’t the most talented, the most celebrated songs shows and movies aren’t the best or highest quality. We live in age now where the most famous are not of any historic import. And the most important historical figures aren’t even famous

The popular memes and narratives propagated by the media are often temporary lobs they throw up to see if they stick, their primary goal being to get attention for themSELVES, in order to make more money for themselves. We make a fatal error when mistakenly assuming their goal is to inform or educate, or improve society in any way.

more “It’s Not Cancel Culture. It’s Course Correction. And It’s Been a Long Time Coming”

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Activism, Alternative History, Current Events, Human Rights, Politics and Government

What the United States Government Doesn’t Say About Iran

September 17, 2019

Just did a refresher study on the exile and last year of the (second) shah of Iran. Was specifically interested in it’s effects on U.S. relations and global stability then and now.

As we already know, Great Britain and the the United States through the CIA with a little help from France perpetrate a coup d’etat in 1953 to topple the democratically elected prime minister of Iran, who had run on a platform of not giving away Iranian oil to Great Britain at below market costs anymore. These three western powers then reinstall the Shah of Iran’s son into power and reinstate monarchic rule in iran. Just what the Iranian people wanted. NOT. Great Britain, France and the US form a new big oil conglomerate from all this free oil they’re about to come into and call it BP, British Petroleum. In exchange they will prop up and support the monarchy in Iran militarily against the wishes of the people and keep down any revolts.

And so begins a renewed relatively stable alliance between Iran and western nations. Iran becomes more and more westernized. Brits move there in droves to run the oil plants. Iranian kids go to British schools and learn English. Highways and streets in Tehran are renamed Eisenhower Boulevard and Kennedy Street.

After a few decades of watching the so called “royals”, elites and western nations blow through all their wealth and natural resources the Iranian people begin to get angry. Like revolution angry. It’s the 1970s. The situation is not helped by the fact that a well educated and well spoken radical Islamic cleric named Khomeini is constantly preaching revolution from exile in France, encouraging the people to rise up against western domination. Protests in the streets begin, calling for an “end to control by America”.

In the late 70s, the presidents of the United States, Great Britain, France and Germany secretly meet in Guadalupe to discuss what they’re going to do about the Shah because their oil contracts are soon to expire and they don’t want to start paying more. Do they depose the Shah? Take him out? Support him and squash the protests and use their support to bargain their prices low for another 50 years? Before they can decide they’re informed that the Shah has cancer from one of their informants. Ah hah! Perfect! Let’s not support him during these turbulent times, we’ll force him into exile and put someone else in power who will give us even more control and lower oil prices.

It’s getting dangerous for the Shah now. He calls his US and British allies to ask for help and they inform him they won’t be able to help him. He should leave if he has to. So he does. First to Egypt. Then Morocco. Then the Bahamas. Then Mexico. By now Khomeini has returned to Iran as a revolutionary hero. Promising an end to monarchy, western rule and a return to democracy. He very quickly kills everyone ever employed by the shah’s government and names himself Supreme Leader for Life. He obviously had watched Star Wars one too many times.

By now the Shah is very sick. In his defense, US president Carter, though he ruthlessly betrayed his ally for his country’s selfish gain, did want to help the Shah in his illness. But the Iranian people were not going to tolerate the US harboring the Shah, healing his illness and then reinstating him again in a year or two. So they stormed the American embassy in Tehran and took a bunch of American hostages and demanded the Shah return to face trial and a return of all the Iranian assets that the Federal Reserve, the US Treasury, American banks and American corporations had seized during the protests. (Some of this money was eventually returned to Iran by US president Barack Obama 40 years later, who also acknowledged and apologized for the 1953 coup, which is what created the current mess the Iranian people are still in today.)

President Carter at this point just wants those American hostages back. He realizes he made a huge mistake by ousting the Shah and allowing this Islamic cleric Khomeini to waltz in and take over Iran. But he cant get enough of his colleagues to agree to give Iran all their assets back. So the hostages are stuck as pawns there in a dangerous political game. The Rockefellers, who are holding billions of Iranian assets in their banks, don’t want to let go of all that money but they do offer to provide doctors and medical support to try to save the Shah’s life. So they secretly fly him to New York. An operation is performed. It’s botched. He gets sicker. They then become fearful the American hostages will be endangered if they continue to help the Shah. So they fly him to Texas and then force him on Panama, using the recently completed Panama Canal deal as a bargaining chip. But Panama too is afraid of retaliation by this crazy mad Khomeini. So they cut a secret deal with Khomeini to extradite the Shah back to Iran to stand trial and be executed.

But Egypt’s Sadat swoops In to rescue his old friend and offers him sanctuary in Egypt. So off they fly to Egypt. The Carter administration calls Khomeini and says “we’ve put the Shah on a CIA plane to Egypt. We’ll trade you the Shah for our hostages. Do what you want with him.” Obviously getting cheap oil is no longer a priority. And neither is loyalty to longtime allies.

The US suddenly brings the plane down on some Portuguese islands in order to secretly hand the Shah over to Iran without telling him (they tell him they have to refuel. They dont), but Khomeini doesn’t trust the U.S. so the deal gets broken at the last minute. The Shah ends up back in Egypt. He very soon dies from complications from his botched American surgeries. The Ayatollah Khomeini does eventually release the American hostages but waits to do it until Carter is ousted from Washington just to twist the knife a little and make his point clear.

He believes he may have found at least a frenemy in new US president Ronald Reagan, who very soon will militarily and financially support a newly American installed ruthless dictator in Iraq named Hussein who is immediately and secretly ordered by the US to attack and overtake Iran. Which he does. In the 8 year Iran-Iraq war. Of course, Reagan, not wanting to play favorites also secretly supports Iran by supplying them with weapons of war to kill the Iraqis, assuming that no matter who wins they’ll just become their ally and help them get rid of the other guy. They both have plenty of oil after all.

Eventually this plan backfires as both countries begin to realize that neither of them want to be subservient lapdogs of the wicked western imperialists. The US eventually takes Iraq out 20 years later. Along with a few other pesky Muslim nations. Only Iran remains, steadfast in their desire for self deterministic rule and autonomy, albeit under excruciatingly unhappy circumstances under a brutal authoritarian rule.

There’s more to the story. There always is. But it all goes back to ‘53 and ‘79. American greed, selfishness,

very poor judgment and ill advised strategy. And here we all are. Happy days.

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Alternative History, American Terrorism, Current Events, Human Rights, Politics and Government, Terrorism 1953, American hostage crisis, American imperialism, Ayatollah Khomeini, Barack Obama, BP, British petroleum, CIA, coup d'etat, egypt, Iran, Iran Contra Affair, Iran Iraq war, Iranian revolution, Iraq, mosadegh, president Carter, Reza Shah, ronald reagan, Saddam Hussein, Shah of Iran

Remembering September 11th Eighteen Years Later

September 11, 2019

When it first happened I was at a spanish language school for a semester down in Costa Rica. With a bunch of mainly Europeans. We watched it happening live on the news like everyone. The Euros immediately jumped at the chance to make comments like “serves them right” or “it was only a matter of time”. And though I understood the sentiment, it was too horrific for me to go down that path in that moment. I was more in shock, and worried about all my friends in NYC.

The only other American at the school, a college kid named Heath, and I got called to the American Embassy in San Jose, where we stayed with a bunch of other Americans, tourists and fishermen mostly, for a number off hours. Eventually released and told it would be a few days before we could fly back to the US. Told not to go out and cause any trouble. Keep a low profile.

So off we went to a brothel where we spent the next two days passing the time trying to drink and fuck the pain away. What the Euros at our school didn’t understand was that although we were every bit as aware of and cynical about the last two-hundred years of violent American imperialism, America was still our home. Americans were still our friends family and neighbors.

When i got back to the States we hit the studio to finish working on the Sleep With You album. But we interrupted those sessions to record a song to help donate to various 9/11 charities. That songs being “Rebuild America”. What I was taken with the most back then was how resilient the country was in the face of such a horrific event. How much it unified us. We didn’t get down or depressed. We got all flagged up, amped up and proud. At the time it felt better than going dark.

So the song ended up being more patriotic and uplifting than our normal fare. I still find it hard to believe that a song called “Rebuild America” is associated with us/me in any way. If you would have told me five to ten years before that that I’d have a single out in the future called Rebuild America i would have asked “is it ironic? Did I lose my mind? Or go mad? Did i lose my cool?” If you would have then replied “no not at all. America got attacked. Like Pearl Harbor scale attack. You did the song in earnest.” Yeah. Perhaps I would understand.

Critics used the song as easy pickings to chastise me for a few years after. Implying that it betrayed “coolness”. Perhaps it does. But I don’t regret it. Because it was real. You had to be there. I always thought that was a cheap shot. Because that event was such a viscerally upsetting moment for many of us. And we needed the release. Regardless of where we lined up on the political fence, it hurt.

There was, looking back now, such a strong subconscious react to that kind of intense shock and violence that manifested in extreme positivity and patriotism. Even for those of us who knew the dark seedy underbelly of United States foreign policy. I had never seen anything like it, that kind of avid patriotism. Maybe Rocky IV Cold War era stuff.

Of course it all went down hill quickly from there and we turned all that patriotism into more violence and empire building. Used it as an excuse to finally take over the rest of the Middle East region of the globe sans Iran, and Saudi Arabia, where the attacks actually originated from, but as they say thou dost not shit in your own backyard and the United States has had Arabia in its backyard for fifty years. Hence allowing one little family to prop up a dictatorship and add their name “Saudi” to the name of an entire country. Disgraceful. But whatever.

further on down the road we learned about the dubious nature of the events themselves… and many now believe it to be an inside job. See the documentaries called Loose Change on youtube. But for a brief moment at least we saw potential in America. It just didn’t last. Very sad.

I saw the planes crash into us

I saw the people cry

I saw the buildings come crumbling

I saw the rescuers sigh

I saw the president weep

On national TV

I saw the volunteers sweeping

To clean the New York City streets

As we try

Yes we try

To rebuild America

The land of our fathers

The land of our mothers

America

We are not alone

“Rebuild America” by Ed Hale & the Transcendence

youtu.be/sf8W8CEJaSs

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A President Should Be Presidential – On China Trade War and the Federal Reserve

August 31, 2019

REALITY CHECK: While many (including myself) agree with the US president’s stance on China Trade, specifically the need to stop forced technology transfers and IP theft (the trade imbalance is not actually an issue; certainly not one that can be or ever has been solved through a race to the bottom tariff war. Trade imbalances between nations of different sizes have always and will always exist. Attempting to equalize Trade monetarily is ill advised. The US president either doesn’t know this yet or refuses to acknowledge it publicly), all who actually work in business, finance and economics wholeheartedly believe that he, and we, would be much better served if he stopped attacking and blaming Jerome Powell and the Federal Reserve for the extreme volatility in global bond and equity markets and the general economic slowdown and instead acknowledged that it is indeed the current trade war with China.

Main-streeters may be entertained by these daily twitter shenanigans (since when is a US president allowed to tweet? Didn’t President Obama have to relinquish his BlackBerry when he took office?) But Wall Street, economists and big business are shocked and horrified. There’s something palpably disturbing about having a commander and chief who knows less than you do about business and finance. Which is why markets have been headed nowhere or down for a year and half and why global bond yields are tanking.

Just because someone is standing in front of you confidently asserting they see a pink elephant doesn’t mean there’s a pink elephant in the room with you. No matter how many times they scream or tweet it. There is never a time when it’s not important to remember this.

The biggest economic conundrum the United States faces at the moment regarding interest rates is that economic conditions are doing well by all measures that The (not)Fed uses to address its dual mandate of maintaining stable inflation and keeping unemployment low. The United States is at record low unemployment. Even by the president’s own accounts… And yes this seeming disconnect in his understanding of basic economics is frustrating. And disturbing. So the (not)Fed has absolutely no realistic fundamental reasons to lower rates based on their long running mandate.

While it’s true that the global economy seems to be heading toward a recession, or worse (over 30 countries now have negative yielding interest rates — with a record 15 TRILLION dollars in global debt that is yielding negative interest! This is historically unprecedented in human civilization), and many now have inverted yield curves (including the US)), the US is still doing impressively well. Meaning lowering rates is not justifiable.

Further rate cuts by the US central bank based solely on other countries’ lowering theirs may excite markets for a day or two, but will ultimately lead to a sell off as investors lose faith in the US central bank’s normally independent, rational and clear headed process. It could also lead to a very fast race to the bottom of treasury rates globally, gut savings and retirement accounts, castrate bank’s’ ability to make money, and further exacerbate the growing global economic slowdown. At that point the world would no longer have the US economy or markets to run to. And THAT would be a major problem considering it’s the last TINA Trade left on earth right now to grow money.

Furthermore if the world does continue to shrink economically and the Federal Reserve suddenly needs to actually lower rates or resort to QE again to save us from impending doom, they’ll have no ammunition left if they lower rates now in a “booming economy”. It’s an illogical argument. And it’s sad that there are decent hardworking Americans out there who are literally learning about these issues from someone who’s either extremely ignorant about them or overtly attempting to deceive them. It’s blatantly irresponsible.

So… what to do? Because most informed people agree with the noble goal of addressing the problems with China trade, most support the president’s courageous attempt to do so at this time. Including me. Tariff wars might not be the best way to do it. Historically they’ve rarely worked. But just starting the process is a good intention. Can’t fault him for his willingness to take this bold step. He’s swimming in uncharted waters. And despite our political leanings he needs our support. Just as we need his.

What he needs to do is stop tweeting insults, attacks, false facts and conspiracy theories and instead sit down behind his desk on live TV and address the nation, to honestly and passionately tell the American people and the world how important this battle is, why we’re doing it and that we all need to pitch in and prepare for some serious pain now in order to secure a better fairer trade agreement with China for our future.

If he did this, the confusion would abate and so too might the market volatility. Hell, markets might even rally just to show support for his newfound diplomacy and honesty and the stability it portends. In addition he might even rally the American people to unify for even a brief period while we face this important challenge. Just a thought.

— Ambassador out

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The Most Effective Manner Of Democratic Self Governance

August 18, 2019

On a recent post on social media about US president Donald Trump one could see 376 Comments. Almost all passionately and harshly bickering with each other over their ever widening partisan divide. 376 Comments?!? That’s a lot of time, attention and energy. All so valuable. Perhaps an assessment of how we are collectively allocating our resources is in order.

A president or prime minister is put simply a reflection of the sentiment of a majority of any given population in a nation state at the time. It is important to remember that. There are others. No one party or platform or group of people has a monopoly on being right. This “rightness” usually exists somewhere in between both extremes. It strikes one as odd how few people seem to realize this when it comes to politics and religion. Especially in the context of everything we have learned and know from a study of our shared human history. It is this forgetting of such a basic truth that has been causing wars amongst human civilizations for thousands of years.

In reality there are both noble and harmful goals being aspired to and enacted by almost every country’s leader in every administration. The people’s’ primary goal should not be to choose sides and defend their candidate’s agenda in its entirety to the death, but rather to step back and monitor the leader’s actions individually as a concerned citizen and protector of their country and its constitution, irrespective of partisan politics. Upon doing so the individual will quickly see that the job of that person is so mammoth and overreaching that the partisan bickering of the populace does nothing but

distract that leader from being able to do their job effectively.

Donald Trump may be one of the most adored and despised presidents in US history, but precisely because of that he is also surely one of the most challenged when it comes to being able to effectively govern. This is never a good thing for a people, lest those people forget that the world is watching and the world is a very competitive place with plenty of bad actors who harbor no good will towards other countries they perceive as competitors.

Instead each individual has an obligation to rise above their emotional partisan leanings and objectively voice their viewpoint to their elected government officials in agreement or dissension of said agenda and actions to help guide and steer the ship of their country’s path forward, That is how a people can most effectively help govern their country of residence.

If for a moment we assume that most people are simply incapable of this high-wire act of both agreeing with some goals of their president and disagreeing with others, due to their impassioned emotions creating an inability to see the bigger picture importance of effectively governing a nation, it still behooves these same people to minimize the effort they put into complaining and bickering amongst themselves and instead focus their attention and energy on actions that help sway the direction of their own governance by said elected officials.

Even simple actions of some substance — a letter a phone call an email a petition starting a non profit or NGO or PAC or a Thoughtstorm group — are better than arguing in the public square. This is the keen understanding that people who lead have had for thousands of years of human history. This is why they are the leaders. There are a multitude of effective substantive actions that every individual in the United States can be taking right now. All vastly more valuable than arguing on social media.

Many in a country’s populace have big juicy noble goals. Though sometimes those goals directly conflict with those of their fellow citizens. This is where democracy and compromise come into play. A mutual respect for civility and democratic ideas that continues long eras of peace and sustainability in a civilization.

Laws can always be overturned or amended. (Think the abolition of slavery in the US.) Disrespect for the law, such as dismissing the validity of the results of an electoral process, or lawlessness most often leads to chaos self-destruction and fascist or communist overthrow. [study the Napoleonic overthrow of France and half of Europe after their alleged people’s revolution on Bastille Day — a still-shocking and vital lesson in the importance of and need for respect civility organization and democratic principles and infrastructure.]

40.755931-73.984606

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Superbacana

July 3, 2019

Three days ago I heard the song “Superbacana” by Caetano Veloso for the first time… or at least it was the first time that I “heard” it, really listened to it. It blow me away. It’s off his Tropicalia album, the one that really shook the earth beneath all of Brasil and started the whole Tropicalismo or Tropicalia social and political movement there. (Along with equal contributions from Gilberto Gil and Os Mutantes and Tom Ze and Gal Costa and others.

Anyway, I do what I always do. I listen to the song ten to twenty times in a row, analyzing the lyrics and the poetry of the beautifully perfect Portuguese language, still in my opinion the most poetic of them all (and yes, being Italian and speaking Italian and French and Spanish etc. I know what a betrayal that may sound like… but there’s just something transcendent about this language, both in how it sounds to the ear and in how the words and phrases are strung together…. Obviously a subjective thing. I’ll give you that.) I then do a quick translation to English to see if I missed anything. Wow, what a fucking song that is. Simple. Fun. Light-hearted. On the surface. And yet still a Dylanesque social protest song. And the way he spits the lyrics out so fast. Truly genius.

Then I spend three days transcribing the chords, listening to it over and over again. Searching the internet for anyone who has ever transcribed the chords to just get some help with it. But no one has. And this song is 50 years old! I WhatsApp a friend of mine in Brasil to ask him about the song. He tells me “yeah bro, not many people know that song. Not even here in Brasil. It’s only hip with super hip people. It’s not like a popular song, like so many of his….Good luck with that. But I really hope you figure it out, because I can’t wait to hear you sing it with your strong funny Portuguese accent!”

I’m going to include some links below so you can listen to the song on YouTube. Because it’s just that good. Bear in mind, it’s 1967, so it still has elements of that orchestrated pop of the sixties, plus elements of the popular bossa nova style happening in Brasil at the time (think Tom Jobim) and yet it also has this frantic rock ‘n’ roll vibe to it and a sort of folky protest theme to it as well. A very hip tune. The whole Tropicalia album by Caetano is brilliant. A definite must-have.

When you analyze the lyrics, basically Caetano is saying “You all act like you don’t even know I exist, but I believe you’re pretending. Not only do you know I was born, but you also know that I am super fucking cool. (Superbacana literally translates to “super-cool”). And he uses the song to rally against the bourgeois class currently occupying Copacabana and the government with all their big spending on technology and other things that he doesn’t believe help him or the people of the country. But in the end he and his people are still super-cool regardless.

When I first discovered it, it reminded me of the song “ManChildWoman”, the way he’s just overtly bragging, very rock ‘n’ roll swagger… Which I admit I do a lot of from time to time in certain songs… It’s all in fun…. Just to catch a groove and ride it. But after studying the song more, I believe there’s more to Caetano’s “Superbacana” than just empty bragging like “ManChildWoman”. Truly. It’s more Dylan. The bragging is more asserting his existence against an authoritarian regime that refused to acknowledge their existence for so long. It’s a life or death kind of “I believe in me” type of thing. Whereas I was there when I wrote “ManChildWoman” (at least I think I was…as much as I could be considering…) and there was no life or death vibe in my mind. I remember. It was more just “I believe in me mother fucker yeah!” They both have their place. It’s rock ‘n’ roll. It’s all important. As important as rock ‘n’ roll can be.

I’m still trying to figure it out. Learning the chords. Trying to learn the phrasing of how he spits out those lyrics so fast. It’s a brilliant piece of work.

Anyway, check it out. It’s a hip tune. Truly special.

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Making Sense of the First Democratic Debates – Proposals and Policies – Part 1

June 29, 2019

Before we dive in to the specific platforms and policies that we heard proposed in the first Democratic Debates over the last two nights, let us address a few things that may have been left out or only alluded to in the last piece I wrote about the candidates yesterday [Read that here if you missed it].

Prologue

I’ve given this some thought over the years…. So from the start I’d like to attempt to share it with you. It’s no secret that I have often been accused of being “wishy washy”, i.e. refusing to take a position on a variety of subjects, not decidedly having an opinion, as most people seem to. On a whole host of matters. This is something I share with a very good friend you’ve heard me reference here in the Diaries many times, Matthew Sabatella (occasionally referred to as Toad in earlier years when these Diaries were more a workshop for the novel The Adventures of Fishy. And with Madeline O’Ryan. We spent our youth teens and twenties often ruminating and philosophizing on a whole host of subjects, finding it very difficult to understand the consciousness of those who could readily just make up their mind on something and give it no more thought. We found, and still do I believe, that important matters often have multiple facets that affect many people.

Despite what you may think you believe, research it a bit more or give it some more thought and you’ll find that it’s deeper and trickier than you first were led to believe. As a Philosophy major and a recording artist this way of being served me well, certainly didn’t hurt me, and in fact led to the whole “Ambassador” ideology that helped shape who I am today. I truly subscribe to the Will Rogers “I never met a person I didn’t like” mentality. Of course this infuriates both my liberal and my conservative friends. But it’s just how I was genetically spun. It’s how I came out. It serves The Ambassador very well. Ed Hale, maybe not so much sometimes. But I just happen to love people, and can usually find it pretty easy to see their side of things… and I just happen to be able to see all sides to almost any issue. They’re all just beliefs after all. Beliefs that we make up in each present moment. Whether we know it or not. (That’s really the secret. But that’s not what this post is about.)

Some people decide to be leaders. They want to be leaders. Some of them choose politics as their way of leading. In the old days, throughout our short history here on earth, these political leaders usually started out as corrupt thieves, conquerors, murderers and warriors. That’s human history in a nutshell. Study it. Royalty is a fancy way of attempting to legitimize being a heartless and corrupt thief and murderer. So too are most major religions. And most of human history’s most famous political leaders. Whether you start at the very very beginning with humanity’s first known “king” Sargon the Great, or the Egyptian Pharoes, through to the Akkadian, Babylonian and Persian kings or Alexander the not so Great, Attilla the Hun, Gengis Khan, Julius Caesar, all the Popes, the Sultans, the Ottomons, the English kings and Queens, etc etc on down the line what you find is a very bloody list of horrible human beings. more “Making Sense of the First Democratic Debates – Proposals and Policies – Part 1”

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A private little world for me… a private little world for you. The online journals and musings of singer-songwriter author and activist Ed Hale. The Transcendence Diaries have been posting regularly online since 2001. Comments are always welcomed. And so are YOU.

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