Or worse, look at Tibet under the Dalai Lama, the most treacherous, murderous, disgustingly brutal theocracy in history. Closed to the outside world for centuries, this theocracy turned Tibet into a feudal chamber of horrors. With a sparse population in a harsh and barren environment that hardly produced enough as it was, a hierarchy of sixty thousand lamas, monks, and novices in thousands of monasteries, backed by their selected warlords, ruled Tibet by unthinkable tortures and abject terror, taxing every grain of support out of a thoroughly beaten peasantry kept in a perpetual Dark Age.
During the 1930’s and 40’s, the Dalai Lama’s entourage and predecessors were so ingratiating to Third-Reich materialism you could not tell them apart. Thinking Tibet held an anthropological explanation, Hitler, with the high lama’s blessing, had several diplomatic missions scouring the country in search of mystical or genetic justification for his right-extremist perversion of Arian superiority. So influential was the Nazi regime that the Dalai Lama’s top foreign advisor and personal confidant at the time reported directly to headquarters in Berlin – a skeleton recently let out of the closet after release of, Seven Years In Tibet, a controversial movie on the subject.
Because of some glazy-eyed image of Shangri-la, I, like most Westerners, thought this Dalai Lama was some kind of reincarnated saint who the evil Communists forced into exile. In truth, as the Chinese marched into Lahasa, the capitol of Tibet, the peasants cheered them as liberators. Unfortunately, those poor, ignorant, battered but gentle peasant souls realized too late that they only exchanged one tyranny for another.
In the meantime, Dalai didn’t dilly as he and his cronies sneaked out of the country, and, like common thieves, stole what remained of the national treasury. By their own laws of karmic justice, however, they squandered it all through a fiasco of swindles and bad investments.
I had the opportunity to confront Dalai and his delegates with these accusations. Their response was, verbatim: “Yes, there were some excesses committed by the lamas, …but if the Chinese would to give to us back our country, … we would not to do that again.”
How sad to see that clown in his brightly colored orange and red robe, and the deceived dreamers that treat him with reverence as he sits mockingly unrepentant, being showered with donations while so many true Tibetans struggle in dire need of a little generosity.
No humor is lost, however, on this staunch, ultra-conservative Tibetan taking Western liberals to the cleaners. The obvious is there for anyone who cares to look. Where are all the new monasteries located? Typical of his Porsche-and-Mercedes congregation, from Santa Barbara to Vermont, all upscale enclaves of naive, jet set, yuppie wealth – the comparatively same aristocratic social stratum he pandered to back home. Like Jed Clampet, this guy went from the mountains of Tibet to the Hills of Beverly. You’ll never see the Dalai Do-Right give a talk in Harlem, Watts, Haiti, Rwanda. As all leaders of mega-buck theology, he has nothing but contempt for the poor.
The greater shame is, although Tibet’s mongrel form of what is called ‘Tantric’ Buddhism is as close to Gautama Buddha’s original teaching as I am to born-again Christianity, it is still a representative extension of a greater philosophy and spiritual insight that offers the human psyche a balanced alternative to the constrictions of Western religious dogma. And to have it so corrupted by this group of theological perverts is a crime of cosmic proportion (the same could be said for the likes of Stair, Peters, Falwell, Robertson, John II, or Graham II, and the way they malign the teachings of Jesus).
Were I the Dalai and his minions I would dedicate the remainder of my days to praying that there was no such thing as reincarnation, for there are not enough lifetimes left in eternity to repay their karmic debt to the six million blindly devoted peasant followers whom after centuries of brutal isolation, they stranded spiritually naked, physically defenseless, and morally abandoned to the genocidal tyranny of Chinese aggression.

911

Though I moved to the jungle of Costa Rica to disassociate myself from man’s insanity, this incredibly ridiculous act of unimaginable madness is inescapable. Who could not be distraught over the torment the families of so many innocent victims must be going through? Again, elitist games have collapsed, and again it is the common that pays most dearly. And while they lie buried under steel and glass, children orphaned, and lives destroyed, the incompetent, pompous politicos and their mogul masters who should be lying under that rubble are shuttled off to underground bunkers and surrounded by armed protection. Although it was Corporate America, not Democratic Republic America that was attacked, they will use this tragedy in Machiavellian tradition to whittle away at your freedom in return for security. And Americans will thank them as the founding fathers’ words fall on deaf ears: “He who sacrifices freedom for security deserves neither.”

Take stock all you gofer politicians who manipulate patriotism through our loved ones’ death. Should freedom of information reveal fifty years from now that like Pearl Harbor you knew of this atrocity beforehand, and your inaction was calculated to connive Americans into a protracted war to bolster the faltering Bush dynasty, …no sweat. Like us, the next generation will only shrug their shoulders and fall for the same old trick. Pull my finger.

If there is anything bright to come of this, no longer do those towers of unmitigated corporate greed overshadow the Statue of Liberty. If only we could make that symbolism a reality.

Some have had the lucidity to ask, ‘Where was god?’ Yet who has had the perception to see that god was co-piloting those four planes – Allah Akbar! National day of prayer? I have but one prayer:

Yo god. You best not exist
For someday should we meet
You will be the one
Whose day of repentance hath come

Then maybe like a witch’s cast this god-spell insanity will be broken and humanity will finally take responsibility for its own existence. I cannot imagine any deity that would not finally breathe a sigh of relief.

As for finger pointing, need I say which finger to use? And where to point it? If the FBI was not conducting warfare on downtrodden Indian reservations, sniping mothers, gassing women and children, searching for some lecherous congressman’s licentious paramour, and disarming law abiding citizens, they’d have had the manpower to intercept and diffuse the bastards they are really paid to protect us from. If the INS gave half the attention to investigating Middle East student visas as they do to hassling grape pickers, they just might have noticed a peculiar ethnic increase in flight training schools. If the CIA spent as much time pursuing intelligence as they do coca groves, they’d know what’s going on under and up their nose. If airlines considered the human factor above protecting the ‘corporate bottom line’ they would have had professionally trained security rather than cost-effective, minimum wage rent-a-wannabes. And if some fanatics happen to get through, why is the lavatory door more secure than the entrance to the cockpit? What forethought – even though I’m being highjacked I can still piss in privacy.

If you had let the Russians have at ‘em there wouldn’t be a Taliban, Afghanistan would not have become the hellhole it is, and Bush/Reagan made billionaire O’shame of bin Laden would not be a threat. And knock off the bovine manure, this whole thing has Saddam Hussein’s middle fingerprint all over it. So when you’re done with the Afghanis, finish what you started in Iraq. Then Qaddafi, then Arafat, then Hezballah, Hamas, Shining Path, Tamil Eelam, Sikh assassins, Kashmiri factions, Ayatollah Too-Many, right-wing death squads, left-wing kidnappers, state supported terrorism, radical fundamentalist from clinic bombers and doctor murderers to cowboy gay bashers, KKK, neo-Nazi, talk-radio hate mongers and theocratic militias of pseudo patriots who insult the meaning of liberty. Bring them to justice? Right! In a body bag. Get the job done. Our patience is none. We have had enough!

With the forty billion dollars miraculously found for this cause, I could buy the minds and hearts of every extremist on this planet and their sorry nations with change to spare. Regardless, in the name of decency may every American swear out of respect and remembrance for those thousands of innocent lives needlessly sacrificed, if anybody pilfers one dollar of that money may their hand be cut off, … at the neck

As for this act of terror, it will go down in history as the most incredibly miscalculated action ever perpetrated on behalf of a cause. What did they hope to accomplish? Fear? They have strengthened our courage. Division? They have brought a nation together like never before. Dissension? Americans have now put their differences on detention (except, of course, the Christian-right who historically have never hesitated to step on others’ pain to leverage their agenda). If the perpetrators were merely delivering a message of hate, mission accomplished.

Now comes reply.

Unless the world’s last remaining superpower is a eunuch, I shudder to think what this sleeping giant is about to unleash. You scum sucking, stewardess throat cutting, cowardly bastards, conceived by your mothers from snake semen have canceled your ticket to ride; your right to exist amongst humankind is revoked. May whatever deranged deity you worship have mercy on your despicable souls, for you will find none in the hearts of any American or other civilized member of the human race.

And once all the macho-strut, tough enough, Rambo, make-my-day, jingoistic rhetoric is done; when passions subside and vengeance once again shows itself to be the hollow satisfaction that it always is; when Gandhi’s warning finally rings true that ‘an eye for an eye and in time the whole world is blind’, may we put down our clubs, sit around a warm fire and once and for all come to a conclusion over just exactly how we are going to divvy the waterhole. Where do you want your precious pissing ground to be? Where do you want to praise your pathetic excuse of a deity, preserve your useless stupidity under the guise of tradition, and practice your ridiculous, oppressive mores you call culture? Then draw a line of reasonable boundary; dare pity the first bastard that crosses it.

(Note how everything mentioned in the article came true… except the solution)

I Wouldn’t Be So Sure

It started as a social conscious movement
A few kids with a loose screw
Been goin’ on since Neanderthal
Not like it was somethin’ new

They grew long hair, needed a bath
Not to mention a shave
With all those drugs no need to fret
They’d be in an early grave

But their numbers kept right on growing
And the next thing you know
Our leaders decided to throw a war
And they said ‘Hell no, we won’t go’

Why, the nerve of these impudent, spoiled brats
Not since the dawn of man
Has a generation refused to defend their country
In some place – what was it called? – Oh right, …Vietnam

The VFW screamed unpatriotic
Objection filled every Legion hall
‘We didn’t like it either, son, but’ja gotta answer
When your country calls’

Preachers harangued from the pulpit
Politicians didn’t know what to do
From Kent State, Birmingham, seven in Chicago
Okie Muskogee, too

These freaks talked of making love, not war
Mocked what was held most dear
And if you wanna draft someone
They said, ‘go draught beer’

Then there was that loud, gawd-awful music
And that stupid ‘…Peace a Chance’ song
By the time they got to Woodstock
They were a half a million strong

This just wasn’t goin’ down as planned
Then these hippies went too far.
‘Hey Establishment, you want a war’ they cried,
‘We’ll give you one in your own back yard’

How much youth need be sacrificed
On your altar of economic greed…
While laid to waste more noble goals
Like a few billion mouths to feed…

Someone needed to wake up these dreamin’
Rabble rousin’, pot head, psychedelic freaks
But the war went on over a decade long
Looking back, who was really asleep…

It wasn’t only war they challenged
They questioned all authority
Especially mainstream’s Holy Grail
Rule of the moral majority

They protested corporate privilege
To pollute without repent
And challenged military/industrial corruption
Pilfering every penny spent…

They had a lot of flaky ideas on
Health care
Military
Education
Equal rights
Politics
Welfare
Democracy
With all the ills ‘twas incomprehensible
How we could call ourselves free

It had to happen, what did you expect…
You take an entire generation
Raise ‘em in a warm home, feed and clothes
Give ‘em the best education

Then tell ‘em to go on a suicidal mission
In some disputed, forsaken, corrupt, unheard of nation far away
After they’ve read Rousseau, Plato, Descartes, and Tennyson’s ’Charge of the Light Brigade’

Wasn’t that what it was all about…
To blame a hippie is to deny your due
If you didn’t want them to use their brains
You should have kept them dumb as you

Then one day they went away
Reality had finally set in
Whew! That was a rough one
Hope we never go through that again

You kinda knew all along it couldn’t go on
Soon they’d have enough
Quickly as it came it went
Like their Magic Dragon, Puff

Twenty years later all’s waned
No one much cares
You even threw a war and their children volunteered
To rescue a bunch of billionaires

Go ahead snicker with snob content
You’ve earned your fun
But as you pass on, my friend
I wouldn’t be so sure you won

Granted, they thought they could move the immovable
Victims of self-delusional pride
But like Murphy in Ken Kesey’s ‘…Cuckoo’s Nest’
At least they tried

If you think hippie was long hair, loud music, dope, sandals, funny clothes, a fad in time
Again you’ve missed the point old man
‘Cause it is,
…was
…And always has been
…In truth, a state of mind

Confident, assured you’ve rescued status quo
You may go…
Quietly…
Bow graciously…

But only a fool would believe you’ve heard the last of hippie
And their idealistic legacy

Ho Ho Humbug

I hate holiday season, all the trimmings, and the greedy consumerism that goes along with it. I’d rather see a tree growing in the forest than dying a decorated death indoors.

Most northern cultures start holiday season with a harvest festival. In the States it’s called Thanks Giving. The Pilgrims’ first harvest feast, which they shared with the natives who taught them what to hunt, fish, and grow. If not for this pagan benevolence these castaway, witch burnin’, psalm singers wouldn’t have made it to New Year. However, why these holy rollers didn’t invite the heathens to the 2nd Thanks Giving is not mentioned in school. And for good reason.

Although Thanks Giving is marked by the gorging of gastronomical delight, barely does your intestinal tract have time to recover before Christmas, another gulping, gut gorge, is upon us. For the weight watchers with a seasonal guilt complex, allow me to relieve your neurosis: go ahead and stuff yourselves; it’s not what you eat between Thanks Giving and Christmas, but what you eat between Christmas and Thanks Giving that counts.

From earliest caveman the winter solstice we call Christmas has marked the heralding of anew, rejuvenation, birth, life reborn. So, if Jesus needs a day of birth, you couldn’t have picked a better one. However, let’s not give plagiarism more than it’s due.

Some claim it’s good to have a season that reminds us to treat each other with Peace, Love, and Understanding. I claim it is no relief, and is, in fact, the problem. Not able to spread such saintlyness evenly over twelve-months, we use it up in a matter of days. Instead of cramming this highhanded goodness into a few cold days in December, try stretching out Be Cool, Get Along, and Give Everyone Some Space over an entire year. Then we’d have cause to carol ‘Joy To The World’, ‘Peace On Earth, ‘Good Will Toward Women’

Though religious revelry is wasted, it is nothing compared to the subliminal sham traditional Christmas music and stories have made of this most sacred pagan fest. Should any of us commit half the crimes that some overweight bozo in a red suit does, we’d be looking at 7-to-10 in a federal pen.

Starting with disturbing the peace just as mom in her kerchief and I in my cap settle down to a long winter’s nap, this inebriated idiot who should be picked up for DUI along with his team of equally high-flying ten-point buck, lands on the roof, which is really not strong enough to support the weight of a bunch of goofy reindeer pulling a sleigh. And you can tell by their names – Happy, Sneezy, Dopey, Grumpy, Doc, Sleepy – that they’re maxed out of their minds on drugs.

As if disturbing the peace, driving under the influence, and parking in a no-sleigh zone are not enough, this arrogant scoundrel compounds his crimes with Breaking and Entering. He comes down the chimney with a bang, gets soot all over the living room, finishes off all your cookies and milk, leaves the refrigerator door open, fills his belly with a bowl full of jelly, and then lights his pipe… not even concerned that he’s in a smoke-free home.
Just as the owner is coming downstairs to catch this criminal, in typical uncouth defiance he sticks his finger up his nose and up the chimney he rose. Then his accomplices, those hot rod reindeer waiting with the get-away vehicle, dash away, dash away, dash away all.

This is what parents read to their children the night before Christmas? This is the character you wish to portray as a role model?

Christmas music fares no better. Listen to the sad but endearing song of the most famous reindeer of all. Yes, Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer. Born with Nosetelia Rosaluminous, a rare genetic affliction, this proud and noble fleet-footed creature of the forest carried himself with dignity as he burdened the laughing and name calling from all of the other reindeer, who never let poor Rudolph join in any reindeer games. What message is this sending to our youth? Although Santa and Ms. Clause could see what was happening out the window of their North Pole estate, still, they did nothing to stop it.

But, this story stoops worse. Then one foggy Christmas Eve, Santa came to say, “Rudolph with your nose so bright, won’t you guide my sleigh tonight?”
I know exactly what I would have said: “No buck skin way, fat man! If you and your glee shouting reindeer think I’ll bail you out, you got another think coming.”

But you gotta hand it to Rudolph. You’re a better reindeer than I am, Gunga Din. With no malice or forethought, Rudolph hitched himself to that sleigh, and at the risk of his life got the team through the gale of that blinding, dangerous fog, and back home safe and sound on that momentous night. And children everywhere learned that… although you make fun of the differently-abled, they’ll gladly help you out in a pinch, so don’t worry ‘bout it. The terrible end of this tale, however, is that to this day, they still never let poor Rudolph join in any reindeer games.

Though the lessons of Rudolph lack social grace, they’re not life threatening. What is life threatening are the actions of another malcontent role model, Frosty ‘the anarchist’ Snowman. No matter how much we instill in our children to look both ways before crossing the street, obey traffic signals, and respect police officers, this unflavored Popsicle can undo in three minutes what took years to get through your child’s thick skull.
While little kiddies chase him, Frosty, with no regard for rules of pedestrian safety, runs through the village bopping everyone with a broomstick in his hand. Running here and there all around the square, taunting impressionable little children to catch him if they can. He runs all through the streets of town right past the traffic cop, where he only pauses a moment when the officer hollers, “STOP!” It’s deplorable!

Though not as deplorable as other lessons developing minds are exposed to through what we proudly hail as traditional Christmas music. Beyond their maturity, children are confronted with the influence of homosexual lyrics such as, ‘Don we now our gay apparel’. Then are musically asked to, ‘Deck their balls with halls of holly’. Each can handle this in their own way, but for me, ‘Mess with me or mine, fella, and you’ll be singin’ fa-la-la-la-la on the moon’.

Songs of infidelity are also no help where a son accidentally witnesses his mother in an adulterous act. Fortunately, I never saw my mommy kissing Santa Clause. Why I’d a goosed him with his own reindeer’s antlers right back up that chimney so fast.

There is a ray of hope in this madness. One voice spoke out against the waste and hypocrisy that has turned this joyous occasion into a nightmare. One man had the courage to stand and challenge the awesome power of the multinational toy and game conglomerate, only to be demonized, mocked, and cursed throughout all civilized land. Scrooge! Yes, Ebenezer Scrooge! The only one who warned us that when you have mouths to feed, a roof to provide, and clothes to buy, especially with the added burden of Tiny Tim, a handicapped child, you should not be wasting precious time and hard-earned money on wanton frivolity.

To demonstrate, Scrooge bought Tiny Tim a ukulele. We all know what became of that. Tiny Tim grew up to record ‘Tip Toe Through The Tulips’ in his nauseating falsetto voice that irritated everyone except Johnny Carson.

But, if Thanksgiving doesn’t give you the gout, and Christmas doesn’t break you financially, you can finish the gauntlet on New Year’s Eve where you get plastered, then splattered all over the highway. So, if you want to make sure some good comes of all this, don’t forget to fill out your organ donor’s card.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night…

Be cool
Get along
Give everyone some space

by Carlos Antonio Brown

The following response is an open letter to Dr. Laura, written by a US man. It’s highly informative, not to mention laugh your ass off.

Dear Dr. Laura:
Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God’s Law. I have learned a great deal from your show, and try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind them that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination … End of debate.

I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some other elements of God’s Laws and how to follow them.

1. Leviticus 25:44 states that I may possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are from neighboring nations. A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans, but not Canadians. Can you clarify? Why can’t I own Canadians?

2. I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?

3. I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of Menstrual uncleanliness – Lev.15: 19-24. The problem is how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offense.

4. When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord – Lev.1:9. The problem is my neighbors. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?

5. I have a neighbor who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself, or should I ask the police to do it?

6. A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination, Lev. 11:10, it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality. I don’t agree. Can you settle this? Are there ‘degrees’ of abomination?

7. Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle-room here?

8. Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev. 19:27. How should they die?

9. I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?

10. My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev.19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also
tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? Lev.24:10-16. Couldn’t we just burn them to death at a private family
affair, like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)I know you have studied these things extensively and thus enjoy considerable expertise in such matters, so I’m confident you can help.

Thank you again for reminding us that God’s word is eternal and unchanging.

Your adoring fan.

James M. Kauffman, Ed.D. Professor Emeritus,
Dept. Of Curriculum, Instruction, and Special Education
University of Virginia

PS (It would be a damn shame if we couldn’t own a Canadian)