Where We Are Today

 

The Nighthawks/ Hopper

 

It's been a dark depressing time since the election and I can't pretend anymore that things will get better. And yet,we keep on,keep on. I'll try to keep the downers to a minium but not today.

" I didn't know the leopard would eat my face."

    Leopards ate my face is the schadenfreude when someone is shocked to suffer the consequences of something they voted for, supported or wanted to impose on other people.

    After every election there is finger pointing, blaming this or that demo graph for a failure. The problem is that the groups blamed are often too small to actually make a difference. Blacks, represent only 12.5 % of the general population, gays a mere %5 if that and yet these groups seem to have the magical power to upend election results.

    No they don't.

    It's the 61% white male population's fault when one side or another wins but hey let's blame the minorities and women for everything.Those terrible immigrants are the source of all our problems. Sound familiar? By the way, people who move here are immigrants but Americans who move to another country are expatriates.

    An election isn't a football game but everyone takes sides like it's one. "Our team is better than your team" except our government is supposed to be a collaboration between parties with compromise. Not anymore. It's our way or no way. The winners claim superiority from any policy that may affect "those people" they are always exempt.

    No they aren't.

    Mass deportation of migrants happened during the depression. Americans citizens -of Asian origin were put in camps during WW2. Germans were also imprisoned by our country and theirs. So were Russians, Chinese. . . the list goes on. Genocide, ethnic cleansing, and civil war happens on a frequent basis with whole swaths of people being eliminated because --reasons.

    The Age of Isolation and ugly politics have divided our society once more, why? In times of disturbance we close ranks, pull the wagons in a circle and hunker down for an inevitable attack. Families, friends co- workers are picking which "team" they are on and want nothing to do with anyone who disagrees. This is the mad division the powerful have encouraged and slobber over. It's also part of the dictator's playbook: control the media, the military and a religion to their cause.

    The threat of environmental, social, and economical collapse is stressing everyone and everyone is sure of a solution. From nothing to see here folks, move a long to whacky conspiracies like the Earth is flat.

    Tribalism has replaced unity. While the winners gleefully laugh at the losers, there are growing signs of rebellion, women in particular are furious at the growing inequality while men see it as threat to their entitlement. The fear of rejection is palatable. The winners absolutely want a world where they get to decide reality and expect the rest of us to  fall in line. They’ve got another thing coming. 

     I'll leave you with a song from the 70's That still rings true.

 

 

 

 

The Wheel

 

Double Helix / watercolor

 

The wheel of life after life,

of karma and revenge.

The victim in one, the tormenter in another,

The roles reversed again.

Shall we play the game of an eye for an eye?

Or rise above and pay the debt for good?

Life after life in an endless cycle

of here and there, of then and now.

A seed is planted, grows, wilts, dies to return next Spring.

No one gets out alive, no one stays dead forever.

The Wheel of Fate turns-- it's your turn.

The Journey made hard with forgetfulness.

The rotten kid does not remember his faults,

Then a monk who pays for past sins with compassion.

The selfish taking another chance at domination,

Then a mother who holds her newborn, with tearing streaming,

and gladly sacrifice everything for the child in her embrace.

Past sins erased with redemption,

Past hatred replaced with love.

Our fate--will it be the same seed placed in poor soil

or will the plant flower and spread across the field?

The wheel never stops.

 

 

The Proving Ground -An Amtrak Story

My Amtrak story

Whenever I travel by train I always pick up one a large folded napkin big enough to write a short story. My recent essays about aliens inspired this one.

 

The Proving Ground

    The galleria was sparsely populated with the usual evening crowd. Mid-term students from the academy, pilots relaxing on down time and those with nothing better to do.

    Que spotted a group of comrades at a nearby table that offered an expansive view of the sunset; a riot of blood orange, purple and saffron hues.

    They hesitated to join the group until one of them waved a hand in recognition. The greeting was cordial with much humming and nodding. Que took a seat next to Beal, the oldest Po, resplendent in an iridescent jump suit and green tresses.

    "Hail the returning hero, haven't seen you in a long time," Beal said with exaggerated surprise. Que merely nodded with a shy smile.

    It felt good to be among familiar denizens Que knew from many, many tours. It had been a long time but their memory was intact, recalling all the planets of all the solar systems they had lived thru.

    "You toured Earth again?" Beal knew but it was an explanation to the three others for Que's absence.

"Six times," They said with a tired sigh. The remark created a pause in conversation from the young ones.

    "Waa, why so many times?" a student from the academy asked with confusion.

    "Stupidity I guess, I didn't have much say in the matter the last time. I'm not going back, I prefer someplace-quieter," Que replied while hailing a waiter and ordering a drink to hide the understatement. The group was stunned at the admission.

    " We hear it's a great place for training," a stout student the color of eggplant offered.

    "Oh yes indeed, their reputation is well founded," Que tried not to sound bitter and cursed the recruiter who convinced them, this time it would be different-even enlightening, annoying and exhausting was more like it.

    "They still engage in petty, tribal genocide, abuse the environment to obscene levels and their gender inequality is beyond belief," Que stated with assurance. The Po students gasped.

    "Well, I have been considering a tour there for social study but you make it sound like it's not worth it," it's antennae fairly quivered in disagreement. Que was amused by the naviete.

    " If you want to find out how tough you are, go ahead but this spirit warrior has had enough."

    "It can't be that bad if you went back to many times, surely there is some redeeming quality." the stout one challenged. Que sat back and thought on that for a long time until the smallest smile appeared.

    "There is one thing worth the rough ride- chocolate."

 

 

Aliens Are Stupid

"This doesn't look like Kansas Toto"

 

    After years of fascination with UFOs and abductions, I'm still waiting for humanity to discover the presence of aliens. I can't wait to watch us freak out, but now-- I'm not so sure that's a good idea.

    Let's start with the premise that aliens have been visiting us for some time as some postulate. The UFO phenomenon I've noticed, tends to make the people studying it crazy. We're not good at dealing with the unknown.

    Despite centuries of alleged visitations, the aliens seem to have a poor grasp of how we function. Bud Hopkins author of Intruders, who hypnotized dozens of abductees, felt the same way. "The UFO occupants with their hypnotic ability to frame and control at least our short term behavior seem, at the same time, to understand almost nothing about basic human psychology." Like humans studying dolphins, they really don't understand us at all.

    The lack of understanding is revealed in encounters that range from mere observation to real fear. Some interactions are more or less friendly where they are inclined to pompous lectures about taking better care of the Earth-to no avail. The scary ones come from uninvited examinations, where we are inspected like lab rats and probed for genetic material to be extracted.

     The concern of the aliens only extends to keeping abductees calm and alleviating their physical pain much like a visit to the dentist.

A famous incident involved Antonio Villa-Bois, a farmer inexplicably plowing his field late at night, who was picked up by barking aliens in weird space suits then had sex with a naked female. The fellow was led from the glowing ship by a thin ladder, confused and embarrassed.

    Jacques Vallee author of numerous books on the subject, is skeptical that many cases "involve highly implausible scenarios with specific elements that can hardly be expected of intelligent interstellar travelers with superior technologies." You mean like using a swimming pool ladder to get out of a ship? We're primitives to these beings, of course the encounters are going to be simplistic.

    Take the case of Carl Hingdon. The aliens rejected him when they discovered he had a vasectomy then unceremoniously dropped him to the ground from several meters up injuring him like the deer they also picked up. Advanced? please.

    The big question is if they are here why don't they show themselves? The answer is obvious-- because we're crazy dangerous. You don't walk up to a wild animal and say hi. Read the news. Listen to the wackiness of Coast to Coast, watch The Day the Earth Stood Still, you'll see.

 

references:

Messengers of Deception Jacques Vallee

Intruders Bud Hopkins.

 

Fake Moon Landing, Real Aliens

(Read as satire)

    When the moon landing happened, some believed it was faked. No, we really did land on the moon, it was an amazing achievement but maybe this   bonkers idea is meant to distract from a far greater conspiracy.

    There is an ongoing theory that NASA and the astronauts discovered aliens were on the moon and it scared the shit out of them. Speculation about their presence was presented by journalist George Leonard shortly after the Apollo missions. Lots of NASA and JPL insiders were showing him photos of artificial structures and the weird things spotted during reconnaissance for a suitable landing site. To this day NASA has no explanation for spots of light that randomly show up and move around on the surface. 

    There is also the bizarre tale by Ingo Swan, a remarkable psychic working with the remote viewing project run by the government. He claimed to have seen alien mining operations there.

    What better way to hide and distract any inquiry about ETs then to spread the claim there was no landing. "Aliens on the moon? Don't be silly, we never even landed there."

Like the conceit of the film "Victor/Victoria" where Julie Andrews pretended to be a man- a Polish Count- pretending to be a woman. "No one will believe I'm a count," She argued. Yes, but they will believe she is a man pretending to be a count. A bigger pretense is used to distract from reality.

    Supposedly the films "A Space Odyssey" and "Capricorn One" in which a landing on Mars was faked, started the rumors and people bought into the fiction.

Isn't it odd that there is a sudden rush to get back to the moon after 50 years of indifference?  Maybe the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) circling for ten years has determined that the ETs left. Recently the Chinese discovered an cave supposedly caused by ancient lava flow on the dark side that could be used for a underground base to protect astronauts from radiation. How convenient--coincidence?

    Wait until they find the monolith.

 

References:

 Essay on reality of moon landing and debunking conspiracies.

https://www.space.com/apollo-11-moon-landing-hoax-believers.html

 Somebody is on the Moon -- George Leonard. 

Insertion Ingo Swann