To Boldly Go: The End of Homo Sapiens and the Creation of Homo Superior

God is declared dead. Now as species, we can turn attentions to our own managed future.

For all the memory we collectively possess, and that isn’t a lot, we know that human nature is a circular journey to be repeated over and over again. Technological advancement however is a linear process. This process is now so rapid we are frightening ourselves with our own capabilities. Think ICBMs , chemical and biological stuff, voodoo DNA manipulation etc and you get an idea of how much the genie is out of the bottle.
Is it all bad news. Well yes if it is controlled by egotistical dictators and extremists hell bent on reversing the clock to medieval status for an us and them society.
And no, if the age of enlightenment continues to supply the benefits of strengthened democracy and limits to the personal ambitions of those who have no regards for the well being of others.

In the short future, just as homo sapiens said cheerio to Neanderthal man and other cousins, then the time of homo sapiens is drawing to a conclusion.

Humanity’s Atheist Future. A new improved species for a new improved world. “Ideas are more important than knowledge.” Picture Posting, The Hague, June 2011

It all has to do with the genie and voodoo stuff I mentioned. Why take a chance with homo sapiens when we can create homo superior by speeding up a process which will happen naturally. Controlled to mirror values espousing human dignity, modern technology offers a door to a future where we can rise above the endless need to hate and destroy each other. A behavioral component most likely essential to homo sapiens character. Why else would we do it.

Moving into the evolutionary fast lane we can surpass our outdated genes and addictions. Evolution can create abilities to conquer our natural predators. Epidemic disease, virus, disorganization, apathy and poverty.

Present time leaders should endevour to managed destiny until we are ready to bury homo sapiens. Refraining to war with ourselves and attacking our cultural and ethnic diversity, while upholding our faith as an evolving species and our future existance within the beautiful universe.

And the timeframe for this transgression to homo superior . If a thousand years is too long or too short one thing is for sure, thinking about it means the process has commenced. “Thus Spoke Zarathustra.”

Bashar al-Assad, Asma al-Assad, Mahar al-Assad, a “Trio of Repression, Murder and Dictatorship.” Syria Calling, there is a denial of information service

In February 1982 Syria’s murderous president, Hafez al-Assad instructed his younger militant brother Rifaat al-Assad to surround the rebellious northern town of Hama with tanks and artillery. The town was then protesting against the secretive regime of the Assad family. Rifaat al-Assad ordered the Syrian army to open fire on Syrian citizens. When the firing stopped approximately 20,000 lives were lost. This event has been described as “the single deadliest acts by any Arab government against its own people in the modern Middle East". The vast majority of the victims were civilians.

As a working journalist in western Europe I didn’t hear about this atrocity until 1991 when I visited Damascus on my way to Iraq’s Kurdistan. Such was the successful cover-up through Hafez al-Assad’s denial of information service to the outside world.

Syria Calling, there is a denial of information service.  Above picture from "A Game of Chess" Gemeente museum, The Hague. by Marcel  Dzama.  

                                  

                            From the video "No one does it like you" Gemeente museum, The Hague 2011 by Marcel Dzama


The current paranoid Assad family of president Bashar al-Assad, his wife Asma al-Assad and his younger murderous brother Mahar, who is currently conducting a siege of the northern rebellious town of Jist al-Shughour, are a reincarnation of this evil, a “Trio of Repression, Murder and Dictatorship.”

It used to be said the first causality of war is the truth. By shutting the flow of information, Assad’s Trio of Repression has assumed the world will forget or become disinterested in Syria. A gross miscalculation in the new information era.

They believe free societies will again ignore events happening in Syria by using the same denial of information to the world which was used by the father, Hafez al-Assad to crush Hama 30 years past.

Addiction to power and privilege may have now detached them from the realities of moral leadership just as it did the father but the realities of the Arab spring will not go away. Information services are here to stay and it is this service to the world which will crush the Assad family in Damascus.

Once the world picks its side, and it has already done so, then the “Trio of Repression” will be outlawed, hunted down and paraded before the international courts at The Hague.

In Sickness and in Health, the International Court must Evolve.

In sickness and in health…Mladic is sick, so he claims. There no doubt in the mind of millions he is truly a sick person. He had no consideration for his own sickness at Srebrenica and went about his work then .

Nicu Ceausescu was also a sick person. Nicu wanted to be exempt from trial and justice but he died all the same from his sickness in an Austrian hospital waiting for a transplant.

Mladic faces the ICFY camera in the Hague 2011, Nicu Ceausesu in the Bucharest dock waiting judgement in 1994

Even though Ceausescu and Mladic are sick and guilty of crimes against citizens they expect to be treated well and courteously for they are sick. And the world, in their eyes, generally consisting of more caring people than they are, should respect their sickness.

The International court took its time to catch the Balkan Butchers but it got them all the same. Mladic and Karadzic most likely will meet the fate of their mentor Milosovic in a prison cell. But this turn of events can mean more for those who know that the world cannot always protect them. When sick people such as the Balkan Butchers and dictators sons attack and kill it is true they often succeed. We are witnessing such actions now during the Arab Spring.

The international court needs to evolve into a proper global sheriff for justice . If protection for citizens  is beyond their capability then at least hunting down the criminals fast and on time is a step in the right direction. It is a shame the world had to wait so long for a political swap to bring Mladic to face justice.

The Balkan Butchers Captured or Dead. Why the European Union should help Serbia.

 Finally, the arrest of Ratko Mladic. Why so long. Facing the truth needs courage.

The Ghosts of unimaginable horror returned to haunt Europe, post Communism.
top, the Balkan Butchers, Sniping citizens in Sarajevo,
The gate sign at Auschwitz shortly before it was stolen.

It cannot escape the attention of those who know this story, the time and means Mladic managed to remained free in Serbia. Professional soldiers fighting for popular causes always win sympathy. But Ratko Mladic is no combatant to be proud of. A self declared enemy of a whole group of people he is cut from the same grain as the psychotic perpetrators of earlier crimes against humanity. Young Serbs I met at the beginning of the war agonized over the route their leaders were taking them, openly sobbing while discussing the unbelievable madness gripping their country and their future.

Some of that madness protected Mladic for so long. Now a new direction is planned. It should be noted that that direction is towards the European Union. Even in the midst of a financial crisis and citizen’s criticism of its management, the European Union still has a noble focus for Europeans. A focus which encompass ideology that within the new European family such barbaric madness will become less of an option to devise and operate. Within the EU, times of social chaos can be shared with and by the rest of the Union. It's the stuff of which to make Rome proud.

There are reasons, and Mladic is one of them, why the E.U. in Brussels must work hard to keep its ideals and founding spirits alive. An overweight privileged centralized clique will harm these principals. Whereas, a leaner and fitter service will provide better value, trust and a following. The E.U is not invincible, nothing is, but it is admirable that Serbs see the Union as a lightning rod for stability and a return to civilized politics.

Europe, through the Union, must focus on cleaning up legacies from its recent past. It must remove the ancient tribal European addiction to violence and horror against those who are labeled different but in reality are the very same.

Balkan wounds run deep and long. Much needs to be done to heal this part of Europe ripped apart in savagery. But the removal of the Butchers is a good day for Serbia.

Journalism Goes where Angels Fear to Tread, The Age of Belief is over Forever

Hurray for Communications.
Communication power highlights the mirage issues of cultural collision, the order of power and sterility of institutions no longer relevant to society. Within a decade of the digital revolution, political revolutions are back in vogue. Can it be because success breeds success. Change is here to stay. The world is better connected and we have nothing to fear from it. Can it also be that personal connections across social and political differences raise questions about the fundamental nature of our character. All is open to debate and the searching eye of modern journalism.

Poggibonsi was revealed to her as they sang--a joyless,straggling place, full of people who pretended.
 When she woke up she knew that it had been Sawston................ E.M Foster "Where Angels fear to tread"

We no longer feel afraid to question powerful circles that thrive on lies and fear. The human species is growing up. Fundamentalists are the last kickback of a dying system where people are asked to accept and believe in things they neither want or understand.
Although it did a fine job fooling all the people some of the time and some of the people all of the time during the Dark ages, the Churches are finally exposed as just a private enterprise selling Heaven and Hell. Heaven and Hell is revealed ---a joyless, frightening place, full of people who pretend.

By cruel betrayal of patrons and clients in systematically brutalizing children in its care, Catholic power and faith towards human spirituality has passed from heaven to earth where people understand and accept the reality of human frailty. The age of belief is over forever. There will never be another heaven or hell. The age of new communications gives rapture to such fantasies before they can become facts.

Senate of Fools: Bank power verses People power

From bankpower bailouts to defense of the unknown person….
It is hard to imagine the NYPD making an error of judgment over the Strauss-Kahn affair. These tough cops know a thing or two about chasing after people in and around the block.

Accusations of power abuse by him are emerging in the light this arrest. They centre on his behavior towards women. Women have rights too and as such should be respected.

But this fair cop by the boys in blue goes deeper than just a flush of passion from some power drunk.It is about challenging the attitude of those, in whom power is invested by the people for the people. And, to whom (the people) they ultimately will be judged for their actions.

The NYPD moved to protect the rights of an unknown against a rich and well connected abuser of position. Well nothing new in that story you might say. Been happing since Brutus and the Gang slapped Caesar in the Senate. But today is different. Cover ups are getting harder and harder to operate. There is no Mark Anthony around to cover Strauss-Kahn. He is on his own unable to make a speech.

 People need a banking system that works for society and its citizens and not against them in the name of profit.

In the new world of instant communication who gets their story out first is in front. Strauss-Kahn whether innocent or guilty is finished.
He has no longer any friends in the Senate of Fools. The game is changing before their very eyes. The masks are slipping from their anonymity. They are human after all. The political/banking alliance is no longer a frightener. Neither is its weapon of virtual debt.
"Let me issue and control a Nation's money and I care not who makes its laws". - Mayer Rothschild, 1790. This is not 1790.

Technology is the rock on which our new society is built and it has ignition., It is taking off like a rocket. Across the world people are winning strength from being in communication and understanding the commonality of their existence. Eurozone leaders need to chose, bank power or people power.

Strauss will be sidelined but not his behavior. That kind of behavior is associated with wrong, and a banking/political system in which its functionaries stray too far from the madding crowd.

The End is at Hand: A Change of E.U. Leadership will mean a Stronger Europe. 9WBWMKNGUCUE

Merkel and Sarkozy have failed to lead the people,

London's Hyde Park corner 1971, during the Cold War.
A time of crisis and financial instability.

opting instead to support the interests of those who print money over the well being of Europe’s citizens.


In times of need real leaders always step forward.
 
So let it be with 2012……. Let Right have its chance to challenge the Status Quo.


Whereas the dream is not over, it is fast becoming a nightmare phase for citizens. Vast sums of computer money is swirling around the financial markets where its addictive lure haunts the offices of those who are easily bought and sold by the roll of dice.
The current leadership was not ever a reflection of those men and women who began the European project. They have become career people, drunk on privilege and shallow on vision; In the pockets of financial institutions who argue life is impossible without them, but never really explaining how or why this should be.

Better to let the citizens imagine their fate should they allow a banker to lose all or permit a private bank to collapse. And never ever ever tell the truth, there is no God, no Hand of Providence, no End to life as we know it, only stories of might be if you don’t vote for those who print the money.

It is tough at the top playing the game of Hide and Seek, but here they come ready or not and if your caught it’s not their fault.

http://martinnangle.blogspot.com/    9WBWMKNGUCUE 

The Great Abbottabad Compound Raid, not a Win but not a Defeat.

The great Abbottabad compound raid takes out a Jessie James of modern outlawism.

War does not just happen, it is created. Sometimes people go to great lengths to fuel its beginning with little thought for how it ends. The world is still at war and has been since we learnt the effect of throwing a stone to secure something we wanted or needed.
For where are we ten years on after 9/11 but only looking at a new phase of revenge acts where the papers will look the same ten years from now.

US forces kill Osama Bin Laden in a raid on his Abbottabad hideout in Pakistan 10 years after the 9/11 attacks.
Picture shows: a compilation of Americian newspapers after 9/11 and ten years after.

They read the same as always. War is never over and we wait and wait for this one to finish as a stalemate and the next one to begin. All wars have roots. They are usually the product of unpopular if not illegal actions by the strong over the weak. We constantly reframe reality to suit our version of events hoping time will banish memory and forgiveness will come with a new set of circumstances.

The Arab spring rolls on and the roots of future conflict are sown in Syria, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Yemen to name a few. But is this the chance for America to turn the page on this issue known as the “War on Terror.” Today it is a stalemate, not a win but not a defeat.

Extracts from newspapers May 12th 2011
US security and and intelligence officials said documents showed Bin Laden had calculated how many Americans would have to die before the US withdrew from the Middle East. He encouraged his followers to attack cities such as Los Angeles, as well as New York.

The fight between us and you was not led by Osama alone," "You have to fight one generation after the other, until your life is ruined. "What is coming is greater and worse, and what you will be facing is more intense and harmful," said Nasser al-Wuhayshi, addressing al-Qaida's enemies.
 (The following day May 13th many innocents were slaughtered in Pakistan by the local Taliban)

Iraq dossier to make case for war …..In secret evidence to the Chilcot inquiry, Major General Michael Laurie said: "We knew at the time that the purpose of the dossier was precisely to make a case for war…….

We have been travelling forever in circles around the imperfect character of homo sapiens with its inherited aggressive nature from animal ancestors. Can the advance of communication and technology offer a future where war is illegal and humanity blends and mixes into a higher level of tolerance. Can we speed it up. Will science be the religion which unites the world away from the mysteries of heaven and hell. We have that possibility, do we have the courage, do we have the leaders.

Eurozone break-up now a Reality as Banking crisis becomes a Crisis of Trust



Kubuswoningen Rotterdam by Piet Blom 1984.
 Living in a cube world 2011 where the
dice has landed against all punters


Even under pressure from growing popular sentiment to dump the Euro and possibly the EU itself, Bankers and to a degree the leadership in Brussels are still refusing to believe they can’t force nations to carry the can for their gross miscalculations. The miscalculations I talk about is plain attitude.

And what an attitude they have towards the everyday “Mob.” Scratch below the surface of “ A pride of Pigs” and you will soon find old allegiances to self preservation and nationhood are not so dead after all.

This crisis of leadership for the EU and hopes of millions for a United and fair Europe is fast becoming a crisis of Trust.


 The millstone of the banking institutions around the necks of nations can and will be cut loose simply because it can.

Bankers can talk all they want about lending this and borrowing that but it matters little if people refuse to sit at their table. After all any nation has the power to create central banks and print currency. Working people know where their interests lie. And it isn’t in a Luxembourg Chateau. If Bankers want to gamble they should also know there is no payout on a fixed fight. Stacking the dice so you win each and every time can soon turn into a roadhouse brawl…………….roll baby roll

The Big Wobble: Will Piggi fuel the Euro meltdown.



The Euro meltdown continues. Will bankers greed reduce the power
 of the currency to junk status.  Has this ever happened before.
  

 When you owe someone a dosh of the old spondulicks it is in the interest of the lender to keep the debtor in business. Crushing his ability to repay usually results in a swift disappearing act. In the case of piggi (Portugal, Ireland, Greece Go Independent) running out of the coral and into the woods, the lender will be faced with a redundant bacon slicer. And the piggi will stay out of sight until the slicer gets so rusty and so unused it becomes worthless.

So let it be with the Euro. Repaying debts marked up in Euros will put the Piggi in the woods firmly behind those who wish to break the power of the lender’s bacon slicer.

Who might that be then. Oh Mr Sterling, Ms Dollar, Master Yen, Swiss cheese et all. French and German politicos and their greedy banking masters should listen to the sound of Molotov Cocktails burning their house down. For like King Canute they will not stop the sea.

The tide of public anger sweeping ashore says loud and clear, Rome was not built in a day and neither will acquiescence to become slaves to a bankers income. Whose army is going to collect the taxes to repay Jean-Claude Trichet. This is not what people voted for in 1973, 1981 and 1986

Reducing the value of the Euro to junk status will not be so difficult if Spanish and Italian people join the walk to the woody woody.

Habet, Hoc Habet, Now he's done for!

It is the fate of combatants to kill and to be killed. In war there are no good guys bad guys acting out the part for the audience. Just winners and losers. Osama bin Laden lost his fight and his life against a better opponent. The US army has done its job and done it well.
It is the role of politicians to sell that action to the people as they will have to live with today’s decisions tomorrow and for some time to come.

Among the graffiti slogans still scrawled on walls at Pompeii, the famous Roman town preserved under a layer of volcanic ash: "Caladus, the Thracian, makes all the girls sigh."

After the July Plot in 1944, Hitler decided that the leaders should have a slow degrading death. They were hung with piano wire from meat-hooks. Their executions were filmed and later shown to senior members of both the Nazi party and the armed forces.
A version of these films was later combined into a 30 minute movie by Goebbels. It was shown to cadets at the Lichterfelde cadet school but viewers supposedly walked out of the screening in disgust.

Watching snuff movies is the stuff to turn stomachs. Let’s hope the White House calls time on this movie and doesn’t get dragged into making a film series of public executions reminiscent of Rome’s Gladiatorial Circus.

Propaganda is a delicate dish. To serve it well one must know the tastes of those who are about to use it.

Osama Bin Laden: the Making of a Legend

The following report is extracted from the BBC London dispatches 3 May 2011 Last updated at 11:09 GMT
US intelligence agents focused in particular on one of Bin Laden's couriers

A high-risk operation was given the green light by President Barack Obama…. his counterterrorism adviser termed "one of the gutsiest calls by any president in recent memory" had achieved its aim, the death of Washington's most wanted man.

President and his team ……..with White House officials watching the operation unfold on a live video feed.

Welcome to Immortality, my Name is......

According to an official from Pakistan's main intelligence agency, the ISI, there were 17 or 18 people in the compound at the time of the attack, while US officials say those who survived the attack included a wife, a daughter, and eight to nine other children.
A woman was also killed. She was originally reported to be one of Bin Laden's wives, though later reports suggested his wife was only wounded. There have also been conflicting reports as to whether the woman who died was being used as a human shield.

The ISI and US officials contradict each other as to whether a detainee was taken away alive.

The al-Qaeda leader was in his bedroom when he was shot twice, officials said - once in the head and once in the chest.
At the climax, at the end of a 40-minute firefight, one of the soldiers uttered the words: "Geronimo E KIA" - meaning a man visually identified by a code word for Bin Laden had been killed in action, officials said.

"The concern was that Bin Laden would oppose any type of capture operation. Indeed, he did. It was a firefight. He, therefore, was killed in that firefight, and that's when the remains were removed......other US officials who spoke to news agencies on condition of anonymity denied that Bin Laden had returned fire.

Bin Laden's body was then flown to Afghanistan before eventually being buried at sea. US officials said this was to avoid his grave becoming a shrine

US officials said this was to avoid his grave becoming a shrine.
US officials said this was to avoid his grave becoming a shrine.

US officials said this was to avoid his grave becoming a shrine.
US officials said this was to avoid his grave becoming a shrine.

US officials said this was to avoid his grave becoming a shrine…………….

The road to Starry Saintdom is littered with crimes and miracles

Celebrity status for holy men now.

Since their concept in the annals of time Churches have revolved around mysticism, ignorance and the necessity to plunder free will. The Catholic church has been no exception to this proven formula for control of human attention. History is littered with horrific legacies of men doing God’s work on Earth.

Destination Saintdom. An advertising poster shows Saint Paul and colleague near Kracow train station 2009.    

Today, Christianity is dying a slow and inglorious death as the mysticism on which it feeds is stripped bare of it sacred shroud by progressive science and universal education. It is being exposed to reveal its self . A pied piper of hope leading children in a merry circle. They follow the tune because the piper promises a reward for those who follow. The children obey as children do. Here is a leader who is taking them somewhere. But the piper doesn’t say to where he is leading them. He leaves it to the fertile imagination of the children to discuss his motives and direction. They fuel the mystic party with whispers and tales made up on the spot. It is not so good to shine much light on mystic matters for that light might disappoint the viewer. So the piper says little and allows the children to create their own world around him and the tune he plays. Thus, avoiding attention to the fact he leads them in a circle with no real destination or purpose to his actions.

The creation of Stars & Saints is a business just like everything else. To profess to the world that someone deserves starry Saintdom as a result of curing a currently incurable disease simply by willing it, is a stroke of remarkable arrogance towards modern scientific sanity. Brilliant if you can pull it off. And even more brilliant if more children follow this new addition in the merry mystical tune of the medieval song, Ring a Ring of Roses a Pocket full of Posies, hush a, hush a, We all Fall Down.

For whom, Power doth crush.

Power is an unpredictable energy. Ask any dictator, revolutionary or parliamentarian. It scorns good and evil alike. It is absolute in its own character, changing, evolving, enticing but never faithful to those who pick it up from where it lies waiting for those who give it life.

Danger lies in its seductive, addictive and abusive nature. It grows, swells and balloons beyond the control of individuals and family cohorts. Like Atlas carrying the burden of our planet on his shoulders, Power finally weighs down its carrier into a broken shadow of their former self. It then deflates becoming again attractive to those who notice its siren call.
Like all drugs which produce initial feelings of grandeur and well being, abuse over use leads to paranoia and eventually death to dignity and self respect. Democracy is an evolving, thought out response to coping with Power’s alluring attractions.


Middle East Dictators, Royals and Authorian regimes face the Book of Power. Its changing personality offers little regard to current holders. Its  focus is on continuing existance. No one has ever controlled Power beyond a given cycle. For Syria, Lybia and the Gulf states, the weight of Power is crushing their cycle. 

 In a recent interview with an international women’s magazine the wife of the Syrian dictator allowed herself to be attached to the following published article. Bashar Al-Assad may be crushing his protesters seeking change but he should remember Power can desert any host, destroying him and his family.

Extracted from the Article "Asma al-Assad, A Rose in the Desert." February 25th 2011, A report of disturbing contradictions:

Asma al-Assad, Syria’s dynamic first lady, is on a mission to create a beacon of culture and secularism in a powder-keg region—and to put a modern face on her husband’s regime.

Asma al-Assad is glamorous, young, and very chic…..She’s a rare combination: a thin, long-limbed beauty with a trained analytic mind who dresses with cunning understatement. Paris Match calls her “the element of light in a country full of shadow zones.” She is the first lady of Syria.
Syria is known as the safest country in the Middle East, possibly because, as the State Department’s Web site says, “the Syrian government conducts intense physical and electronic surveillance of both Syrian citizens and foreign visitors.”
It’s a secular country…… the Muslim veil is forbidden in universities, a place without bombings, unrest, or kidnappings, but its shadow zones are deep and dark. …..In Syria, power is hereditary. The country’s alliances are murky. There are souvenir Hezbollah ashtrays in the souk, and you can spot the Hamas leadership racing through the bar of the Four Seasons. Its number-one enmity is clear: Israel.


Iraq is next door, Iran not far away. Lebanon’s capital, Beirut, is 90 minutes by car from Damascus. Jordan is south, and next to it the region that Syrian maps label Palestine. There are nearly one million refugees from Iraq in Syria, and another half-million displaced Palestinians. “It’s a tough neighborhood,” admits Asma al-Assad.
The story prints three comments Posted: 2-25-2011

1, In the midst of the chaos in the Middle East today, it is refreshing to read about Mrs. Assad. Polished, poised, well-educated, articulate, beautiful, she is a woman to admire in these tumultuous times


2, I really enjoyed my view into Mrs. Assad's world. She seems down to earth and dedicated to her causes. Great job for daring to profile a woman who is not a cookie-cutter American!


3, This may be the most disgusting article ever published in Vogue, and is surely the first time it has ever put out pure propaganda for a ruthless hereditary dictatorship. It is like all the pieces claiming that Gaddafi's son Saif was some kind of good guy reformist (how stupid do they look now). What's next for Joan Juliet and the once-admired sellout Nachtwey (writer& photographer) -- an admiring profile of Mugabe's first lady? Kim Il Sung's daughter? Hey if Gaddafi does somehow stay in power why not do one of his wives. You should be ashamed.

In democracy, opinion matters. As such it becomes less threatening to those who hold Power for the time they have it.
http://omgeemag.com/2011/03/07/vogue-on-asma-al-assad-the-first-lady-of-syria/

http://www.vogue.com/vogue-daily/article/asma-al-assad-a-rose-in-the-desert/

SuperState feels the heat. Bail-out crumbles as the Pig leaves the Euro Zone.

It was a bad day for Brussels as the Finns added to the rumble and hum of displeasure with the way the Euro crisis is being playing out. Or was it really that bad.

After all, nobody wants a mooching nation as a partner. And no nation wants to be a Pig either. (Portugal, Ireland, Greece)



You're barred ye wee slecher, yiv drank too much
 and now you're drunk. Come back when you're sober.

 This E.U. parlance about defaulting, restructuring, leaving, fighting in the streets, veto, burning bankers, haircuts and uncle Tom Cobley and all means only one thing. Something is gonna give and give very soon.

Look at it logically, no-one and I mean no-one is going to take unwanted medicine when they can throw the bottle in the bin. So Mammy says she will force you to take your medicine, to which, often is heard "Oh yea, you and and whose army is gonna make me."

That’s right, the EU has no army. Not like Rome with its mighty legions. Just a bunch of un-elected bureaucrats with no stomach for a bad press.

So maybe it is better and possibly the preferred choice if the over fed Pig were to cut loose. Let the Euro ship bounce back up on top of the waves, lighter and faster than before. Where it belongs. I don’t hear Norway, Sweden, Denmark or the UK complain about not being part of the Euro nor do I hear anyone else for that matter knocking on the door asking to be let in. But a Zone without the Piggi, well that a different story. (portugal ireland greece go independent).

Enter the Finns. Should they block the, or should I say, be encouraged to block the bail-out for Portugal. It is fait accompli for the crisis. Our Pig gets a break from the bacon slicer and the heat is off Mammy in Brussels to dish out the medicine. What’s the big deal, its only money after all. You just print the stuff.

Ireland: a choice of aspirations, a crisis of loyalty, a home to live in.

A recent visit to the family holiday destination of my teenage years washed up memories of Edna O’Brien, De Dannan and soft plumes of burning peat. Donegal never fails to stir passions and our love for this wild and beautiful land.
It is a dark, lonely and adventurous track to the holiday cottage, There was initial doubt in my choice of direction. But knowing Donegal it is best to stay on course and follow directions from those who have before paved the way.

The piercing wail of a banshee forewarns of tragedy.

“When you are poor for so long the taste of money from a spoon can be so sweet to a tired life,” I heard it on the wind. A shivering wail from the mysterious Banshee.

Aspirations to match the success of others is understandable and I believe every country has its fair share of those who would do irrational deals just to taste from the spoon of wealth.
The upgraded renovations to this thatched cottage outside of Killybegs retains traditional rural characteristics. A way of paying homage to human presence who developed a relationship with its environment.

Regeneration in general, is an aspect of progress alleviating the misery of poverty. It gives opportunity to enjoy comfort while appreciating our ancestor’s contribution to culture.
The house next door misses this principal to the land and its culture. It marries money to debt which in turn leads to misery. “What’s it for” I asked a local. “It’s a guy’s holiday home, he used to live around here in poverty, in dreadful conditions, he got good in England, now this is his statement. ”

Con's cottage Killybegs

Cormack's cottage Killybegs

“Better to be poor and free than rich and in bondage.” The calling cry of endless rebellion and insurrection.

For most of us individuals seeking improvement to our standards the answer to this call will never be tested.
But for Ireland there is no doubt. Our debt is to our traditions and culture and not the debt slave traders of modern politics, property monarchs and gladiator bankers.

As for the owner of the big one on the hill. Seems like, according to local legend, he renovated the old family hovel and lives there contented he became a success.

American Civil War, a view from across the pond

Political America has been on occasions compared to a football pitch. Not a regular pitch with 22 players fighting a turn at the ball for the camera to shine a light on their point of view, but one crammed with hundreds of players, each with something to say. Each believing their message to be the most important. Each knowing the game has only 90 minutes and when it’s over there is no point in playing on until the lights are back on and the game resumes.

Now, I ain’t no expert on Yankee speak or Southern ways. But what I do know is Uncle Sam can work for those who take to the pitch because they keep on showing up game after game after game.

However sometimes as we know, players turn nasty. The civil war 150 years ago should have taught “We the People” just how nasty a “Divided House” can get.
The slaughter was horrendous but the outcome gave certain possibilities for a united America to become comparable with mighty Rome. Was the price worth it. Only the fallen can give such approval. We can but only guess their answer.

A symbol of US unity flys over the Boston skyline 1988, a town synomymous with the birth of America 

Some say in America today a rot has set in, a belief, that America can split up based on the friction lines of 1835-1865 to become cosy enclaves for a variety of interested groups.
A spreading Spanish speaking America is annoying those who look back at Wasp power. Some bible belt Americans from the former Confederacy states don’t accept diluting Christianity as a daily influence guiding lives. And some in the multicultural north eye marriage with eligible Canada, a new mighty force with resources and markets to exploit. According to observers, American politics is becoming nastier and polarized.

But this is not 1861 and should the great man himself be around today he might well re-enforce the spirit of a united America, but a repeat of the division which taints some memories to this very day he would surely avoid at all costs.
America’s greatness lies in its ability to accommodate all those players on the pitch. Is the pitch becoming over crowded. Dividing it up, makes for smaller farms with bickering neighbours. Building extensions to the family home creates more work and room for all.
It’s a new world since 1861. Global is here to stay, warts and all. This is not America’s time to ponder division but time to play the last post on the Civil War. Honour all who gave their lives for America and look forward to centuries of destiny.
Rome was far from perfect, but it lasted so long because it mattered that it should last. Its decline is steeped in division and loss of direction. Divorces begin in the home and it is in the American homeland where healing is needed. The Civil War can become the Civil marriage. It just takes time out to plan a pitch strategy. The game goes on.

France lost its fifth Republic on April 11th 2011 entering an era of punishment, punishment and more punishment aimed at controlling the private choice of individuals.

Idiotic statements by French prime minister François Fillon, "The French Republic lives in a bare-headed fashion” is representative of the narrow minded views of extremists who destroy that which they don’t understand. Fillon, like his former foreign minister Michele Alliot-Marie is linked to north African dictators with little or no regards for human rights.

A new law aimed at bringing freedom and equality to French Muslim women imposes a fine of 150 Euros for women breaking the law against wearing clothing of their own chosing. They can be ordered to carry out public service duty as part of the punishment or as an alternative to the fine. Whether this law applies to foreign nationals visiting France and wearing Burkas remains to be seen.

Forcing a woman to wear a Niqab or a Burka is punishable by a year in prison and a 30,000 euro fine. Forcing a minor to do the same is punishable by two years in prison and 60,000 euro fine.


Lawmakers have cited security reasons forbidding people from covering their faces in public, “This practice, even if it is voluntary, cannot be tolerated in any public place.” State Security services are excluded.

The Sarkozy government has called wearing the Burka "A new form of enslavement that the republic cannot accept on its soil."

Forcing people to undress by the French Government is permitted and apparently approved by 82 percent of the people. Given that France has a 10% Muslim population, similar in number to Egypt’s Christian Population where there is no law forcing Christians to wear the Burka, then every French man, woman and child is behind this violation. A remarkable assumption for a country who gave the world the French Revolution while embracing Thomas Paine’s “The Rights of Man.”

It is a perversion of terms to say that a charter gives rights. It operates by a contrary effect — that of taking rights away. Rights are inherently in all the inhabitants; but charters, by annulling those rights, in the majority, leave the right, by exclusion, in the hands of a few . . . They . . . consequently are instruments of injustice.

The fact, therefore, must be that the individuals, themselves, each, in his own personal and sovereign right, entered into a compact with each other to produce a government: and this is the only mode in which governments have a right to arise, and the only principle on which they have a right to exist……..Thomas Paine “The rights of Man” 1791

Clear majorities in Germany, Britain and Spain, have also backed Burka bans, a recent survey has found. Strange these former colonial countries with disgraceful histories towards the culture and human rights of others, profess this action to be in the name of Democratic choice.

Amnesty International is right to criticise France on this ban, saying it violates European human rights.

Thomas Paine was tried in absentia, and condemned for writing “The rights of Man” in 1791. However he was unavailable for hanging, having departed England for France, where the Revolution against President Sarkozy’s Fifth Republic exploded on April 11th 2011.

Imagine a world of 123 billion people, population problem is a full blown myth.

If by some tragedy the population of the world was reduced to half its present number, and I continued to live, then in population numbers I would be back in the year 1968 listening to Jimi Hendrix playing All along the Watchtower and reading the Ehrlich’s book about impending mass starvation.

Back then at school we discussed population explosions, imminent food crisis, nuclear war and the end of time. It seems we have always discussed these topics with an apocalyptic overview.

Sweedish-American Plantagon, experiments with urban farming.

But the human being is made of sterner stuff. Whatever is thrown at it, war, disease, natural disasters and the rest, we march forward. We are better fed, live longer and are accelerating in knowledge and understanding faster than at any time in our history.

The idea of cutting population numbers to help mankind enjoy the labour of past generations is a full blown myth. Shoulder to shoulder we can put the world's, soon to be, 7 billion humans in the Los Angeles district. So what’s the fear over space. 70% of us will live in massive cities. Urbanism is here. Ruralism should become free and freer. Growing the food in down town office blocks converted to state of the art greenhouses will become a great food business. It will make transport and heating costs disappear while producing fresh and varied produce.

Genetic modification science is a tremendous gift to humans. It releases us from the constraints of past tales and fear of the unknown. Doomers and gloomers should think again over population. Population growth is welcome. What is needed is to embrace this explosion as wealth. Make more food and resolve problems collectively, as a unified species. What is to be gained from further confrontational politics. Anyway, the future is here as we speak. We add 6 million humans to the cause every month.

I see ahead, a world not of 9, 10, 14 billion people but 65, 95, 123 billion people creating a beautiful and realistic liaison with the planet. We constantly ponder over failure while forgetting our great ability to adapt and survive. We should accept the evolution of revolution. Strange I know, but then in 1968 didn’t people say Imagine and I have a dream.

The blindness of Absolutism and the fall of the house of Saud

There is an old story about a vain and foolish monarch who wears no cloths before his people. He parades in a procession naked because he has been told his new suit is invisible to those unfit for their position and/or, those who are hopelessly stupid. 
 

The Emperor cannot see the cloth himself, but pretends that he can for fear of appearing unfit or stupid; his ministers do the same. 
 

A child in the crowd calls out that the Emperor is wearing no clothes and the cry is taken up by others. The Emperor cringes, suspecting the call is true, but holds himself up proudly and continues the procession because to accept the truth he is a mere mortal like the rest of us would reveal his vanity and corrupted outlook on reality. 
 

The rise, rise and rise of people power is making the old political world cringe. And more so in the world of Arab autocracy, theocracy, dynasty and dictatorship.

Recent articles in western press makes grim reading for the House of Saud. They suggest the recent surge in oil prices is a planned shot across the bow of new Arab democracy movements and popular western support for it. The House of Saud is saying encroach on our easy street and we have the power to send you harsh recession and pain.

This strategy is of the same tale as the above story. The house of Saud does not hear the child cry out the truth. There is no longer any legitimacy in Absolutism.

Oil addiction is challenged by winds of change seeking to turn a new dirrection. Times is running out for the house of Saud as people grasp a rare moment of clarity over energy conflict.

Creating an oil price bubble by either cutting back on production or encouraging financial investment banks to buy oil at any price, hoard it in vast depots such as Rotterdam harbour and then bet on the price rising further will create a firestorm of public anger and resentment at the idea public standard of living is controlled by a few bankers and monarchs desperately clinging on to systems people have lost faith in. 
 

In such a scenario, it would be in the West’s interest to fuel regime change to support partners we can assist develop democracy, new energy, global co-operation and in whom we can be proud of. 
 

When push comes to shove, as it nearly always does in revolutions, the alliance of Absolutists and investor banker vampirism will face populations with more in common that they might realise. Betting on their own victory might prove a bit dicey; for small sparks can turn into flames.

It seems, for those watching from the sidelines, the enemy of the state is the friend of the people.

Tunisia and Lybia fight on

Her Master's Voice "When I am on holiday, I am not foreign minister." Declared Michele Alliot-Marie, the French foreign minister, who has resigned following weeks of criticism over her contacts with the former leadership of Tunisia. This politician offered the Ben Ali regime, now tarred as a "Culture of Corruption," to send the French heavy squad to help defeat the citizens of Tunisia seeking change and democracy. She actually supports a discredited dictator. former foreign minister Michele Alliot-Marie offered to help punish citizens seeking democracy. "I do not feel that I have committed any wrongdoing" she said. It later transpired she was fiddling about in the cookie jar looking for gold plated sweets. Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu! The times to start, or to finish, the times of lightening, or of suffering, My God! My God! ( Edith Piaf). And those in Paris, London and Berlin who have never agreed much on anything in the past and who play the political one- up- manship for the home game have the gall and audacity to undermine the EU external service minister Cathy Ashton. Ashton was given a mountain to climb and no doubt all the dodgy nods and winks of support swirling the corridors of a Byzantine court in the Place de Luxembourg. Ms Ashton's response might look limited. Getting some of Europe's foreign ministers to support democracy during an overdue popular uprising is a problem, never mind the Buzzcocks. The EEAS needs to speak for the EEAS. It is her job to be an alternative to the likes of Michele Alliot-Marie. the EU's Cathy Ashton Right now Ashton needs her voice to speak for Brussels. It is Brussels opinion we want to hear. It should reflect the spirit and view of the European project and not the chameleon interests of London Paris or Berlin. Revolutions begin at home, make one in EEAS Brussels.

The Irish election 2011, Sinn Fein goes South

In post heady days of Banker rule in Ireland and elsewhere, a severe hangover from the long party of greed has produced election results for a party of change.

Sinn Fein is on course to play a part in contemporary Irish politics after eighty years in the cold. The ruling Fianna Fail party of Ireland’s first president and IRA uprising commander Eammon De Valera, who split from Sinn Fein in 1926, has lost its mandate to govern; being accused of betraying the nation to bankers and property developers. But bankers and developers are not the only ones to carry guilt and responsibility for the mess. 

On the March. Sinn Fein pictured in Belfast 1989 during the movement's
 transgression from armed struggle to political success.


Opportunities are lost and won, as Sinn Fein knows very well. This opportunity to put Ireland first before the ingrained pursuit of financial and social betterment at all costs, which has bedeviled Irish society as a struggling emerging nation, will be tested from the beginning.

The Irish who had most in life generally had little money, but owned a wealth in music, culture and pride. They are admired more for this than their over inflated six million euro property prices which stand up for ridicule.

Europe is now part of the landscape, Art of Superstate will also be tested this year. Dealing with the EU needs attention, flair, vision and firmness. But most of all results which work to move Irish society forward.

E.U facedown, Inside Job, Betrayal and the Political process.

As revolution and rebellion sweeps across the Al Maghreb, a quieter revolution is happening this week in Ireland. Power is shifting by use of the democratic political process.

Democracy accommodates those on the edge of the political spectrum. The ruling Fianna Fail party is declared betrayers to the Irish Republic by its citizens and is punished accordingly at the polls. Being relegated to the edge does not necessarily mean an end to that party. Sinn Fein was once the mighty all Ireland party but was squeezed out into the cold after the civil war and independence. It is ironic, Sinn Fein, often belittled in the past by Fianna Fail, is now tipping its hat to this former establishment party as it passes it on route to success while Fianna Fail sulks towards wilderness.


E.U. is shown citizen anger. Frankurt 2011.                      Belfast 1981, Donaldson was murdered for betrayal of his people.

Enter the dragons of challenge. The Irish will question the terms of the Inside Job. (Bailout). The Three Presidents heading the EU are facing issues of credibility. Euro skeptics are focused on disclosures of indulgent spending, intransience over political transparency and the ever increasing knowledge, that change can happen anywhere if citizens decide to go for it.
If the marginalized Sinn Fein can march back into central Irish politics after so long as the result of a corrupted central party being itself marginalized, then the three EU presidents should take note.

“While not everyone might wish to plant a revolutionary bomb, everyone can plant a revolutionary vote.”

Donaldson, on the Sinn Fein 1981 election slogan (pictured above), was eventually executed for betrayal of his people. The gun is gone and politics has moved on from those troubled days and whereas, “times they are a- changing,” betrayal of the people never receives much mercy.

The Talented ‘Vinnie Who” comes to Rotterdam Town

Young, fresh and passionate is how “Vinnie Who” looked, sounded and performed on stage last night at the RoTown club Rotterdam. Just a touch over one hundred people of mixed gender, age and background turned up to hear an exciting gig on the second leg of their Live 2011 tour. Although they are just three years together, this band plays with the style and cohesion of a group who works, thinks and lives life together.

They classify themselves as pop/disco but sounded to me like an evolution of dance and rock. One thing’s for sure, this music will make you want to pop, disco, dance and rock to each and every number.

"We are a band from Denmark," Vinnie Who 2011 

Their front row line up, Kristina Kristensen, Niels Bagge and Dennis Morton bring the party to immediate life with their flair and stage action supported by the back row heavy sound of Simon Stefanski, Martin Sandberg and Martin Sahl. The audience appreciated the opportunity to join in and for the duration were captivated by the band’s strong sense of powerful style, rhythm, bass and synths rock.

“We just need to be on the road playing, being new and keeping in touch” said Simon backstage after the show. Earlier, I heard Neils introduce “Vinnie Who” simply saying “We are a band from Denmark” Lets watch and listen as they make it from Denmark onto the world stage.

As for keeping in touch I will hear the band again this Sunday 28th at Paradiso, Amsterdam where they gig in an evening line-up.

Long live the dead Ceauşescu, Gadaffi stars for martyrdom.

Just over twenty years ago I photographed the dead Ceauşescus from a Bucharest TV. Then I needed a vast array of portable equipment, a tonne of cash and a job with the Associated Press. This day, in Netherlands, I didn’t even need a camera, just two buttons on the computer keyboard, an optional coffee and the Internet. Streetfeed, (citizens journalism, crowd reporting) has changed the world.

From Ceausescu to Gadaffi, the monsters of Politics fall to the Evolution of the Revolution. Che LIVES..........

The era of Evolutionary Revolution is upon the 21st century. The American president may not have fully grasped the extent of his election slogan "Change we can Believe in" and the chant "Yes We Can" would determine the mood of other peoples desperately seeking just those words……….

The praetorian guards surrounding paranoid latter day sultans, emperors, kings and dictators alike are usually the last to admit the game is over for their paymasters. But when they do, usually they are the ones to administer the Coup de Grace….. for money of course.

Gadaffi’s (mad dog) actions against the Lybian people has assured his place in the Graveyard of unmarked tombstones. The fact that no visible external threat from the great Satan or the little one either is producing incredible uprisings against these power and wealth drunks shows change is believable, happening and will continue to happen until Politics is changed forever. Gadaffi may claim to be the father of the Bunga Bunga, but a revolutionary Che Guevara he certainly isn’t.

The Arabs ride out, Jordanian tribes face Queen Rania. T.E. Lawrence gives advice.

Like some episode from SHE, thirty-six representatives of Bedouin tribes rode out to face their Queen whom they accuse of creating centres of power serving her own interests. Another in a series of remarkable events sweeping the Arab world.

A Bedouin rides from the treasury in Petra just north of the Wadi Rum. The Rock formation was named "Seven Pillars of wisdom after T.E. Lawrence of Arabia (above) who from there led the Arab revolt 1916-1918. Above Queen Rania and husband wave to the crowd in Amman Jordan. 

Queen Raina, who often appears on the covers of gossip magazines around the world, endures a glittering lifestyle. Her widely reported lavish 40th in the Wadi Rum desert last August raised more than party spirits. The Bedouin delegation produced a letter warning the Monarchy “Jordan will soon face the flood of Tunisia and Egypt.” They pointed to suppression of freedoms and the looting of public funds and highlighted her entourage as over indulgent.

Flashy Queens and party political leaders must realise that the game has changed. Leadership is for real in the modern world and no longer a safe career move for the crazy, the wealth drunks, the torture and control freaks. SHE, who must be obeyed, might take a leaf out of the book by T E Lawrence of Arabia: “Some believed that a rebellion would enable England to defeat Turkey….the nature and power of the Arabic speaking peoples made them think that such a rebellion would be happy….so they allowed it to begin…“Seven Pillars of Wisdom”

T.E. Lawrence by the way based his insurgent operation out of the Wadi Rum.

"Bye bye Belgium," welcome Wallonie, Vlaanderen and Brussels, capital of the new EU

If it is done, and now is as good a time as any, Belgians, by not reforming a central government, will evolve organically into a very loose confederation.

Under the wider stability of an EU Superstate and eventually the Eurozone, existing regional governments Le Gouvernement Wallon and Vlaamse Overheid will expand and continue to run their respective regions. Change is difficult but often necessary. It is unwise to force a marriage to continue when it is clearly over. Eupen is Germany.

For divorced Belgians it will be a release they can adapt to. Wallonia will need EU support as it restructures its economy and this also might mean a huge influx into Brussels by French speakers searching for work.

Can this help Brussels become a true capital for the EU. Maybe, it would need to happen. Brussels at present is an enclave for revolving bureaucrats serving the vast EU institutions. Whereas Whitehall, Washington, the Kremlin etc are also enclaves of sorts they preside over strong sovereign states which don’t get dissolved like Belgium.

Brussels is a capital of institutions rather than a State, federal, confederate or whatever. As it is, it can be easily dissolved by telling its ever increasingly expat community of revolving servants to just not turn up for work as we are now closed for business.

If Belgium ceases to exist and there are signs it will, then Wallonia and Flanders will become the first true members of Dimension; Art of Superstate.

Bahrain royals facing destruction

A Bahrain student wears a makeshift
gasmask during the Gulf war 1991

The Bahrain Royal family are facing imminent destruction. The cold murder of innocent civilians in the middle of the night by what is primarily a Praetorian Guard (recruited externally and loyal only to their Royal paymasters) can only lead to the formation of a counter freedom movement with military overtones. Iran is just north of Bahrain and the US 5th Fleet is stationed there. All the right ingredients are there for a classic insurgency against a dictatorship. Will Obama back the Royals. Can 3000 members of the Royal family hold out against 800,000 Bahrainis and a flood of Al Quds revolutionary guards. It's the Alamo over there for these guys. Except these Royals are supported by nobody, only other Royals. There is no Davey Crocket or Jim Bowie in their Ranks. I know I met some of them during the Gulf war. (post # the berlusconi effect). In this scenario it is essential the US supports the removal of the Al Khalifa family. A real democracy will see the wisdom of the 5th fleet. Young combatants in an Iranian backed insurgency will just see enemies.

Tell them about the dream, Martin.




A Martin Luther King Poster in Berlin

 

Sitting out the heat in Manama 

"No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness, like a mighty stream."

"It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment."


 "Let freedom ring."