[Editor's note: This story first appeared in 1991 in Leisure Weekly, Keene, NH, USA, where the author was once managing editor.]
A good society is a means to a good life for those who compose it; not something having a kind of excellence on its own account. - Bertrand Russell
In a perfect world, there would be no soldiers, no police, no crime, no hatred, no oil spills. A ritually stabilized world population, structured so each person connected with an actualized family unit, would have behaviorally internalized integrity and civility and this was reflected in friendly social behavior and totally amiable international relations.
Osama, dead and buried, is the reason George Bush and the NSA are snooping your daughter's cell phone calls to her boyfriend, or reading your email, disregarding the Constitution, and turning America into an Orwellian police state. All of this is necessary because, who knows, your neighbor might be a member of a sleeper cell or a vegetarian.
US President George W. Bush said today that a controversial domestic spying program that some critics say is illegal was necessary in light of new threats on an audiotape from Osama bin Laden, reports the
Herald Sun. Listen to the words of Osama bin Laden and take him seriously. When he says he's going to hurt the American people again, or try to, he means it, said Bush, and that's why the government needs to know what books you check out of the library. I take it seriously. And the people of NSA take it seriously. And most of the American people take it seriously as well. Bush tells us the Bill of Rights must be sacrificed because al-Qaeda has placed operatives inside of our country. They blend in with the civilian population. They get their orders from overseas. And then they emerge to strike from within. Never mind that since nine eleven not one al-Qaeda terrorist has been apprehended and convicted of plotting against the United States.
© APAmerica's most wanted … Abu Musab al-Zarqawi taunts George Bush in the 34-minute video.
It's amazing the way the corporate media simply passes along unsubstantiated claims and outright Bushcon propaganda as fact - for instance, over at the
Chicago Tribune, it is said an "al-Qaida offshoot" is "spearheading the anti-U.S. insurgency in Iraq," in other words, according to
Joel Greenberg of the Tribune, the al-Zarqawi black op designed to discredit Iraqis who are attempting to end the illegal occupation of their country are terrorists who blow up hotels in neighboring countries. No doubt Greenberg is paid well to make up such fairy tales - or rather pass along the lies and distortions contrived by his editors and the Bushcons.
"After first claiming responsibility for the Wednesday attacks on three hotels popular with Israelis and Westerners, al-Qaida in Iraq later issued a second Internet statement that appeared to acknowledge that its tactics may have backfired and undermined any support the group enjoyed among the Jordanian population," writes Greenberg.
In other words, the intelligence ops who issue these "internet statements" for the dead al-Zarqawi's P2OG false flag terrorist group decided their initial story didn't hold water, so they are sending out a clarification via one of their secured servers."The group said the attacks were launched only after its leaders became 'confident that (the hotels) are centers for launching war on Islam and support the crusaders' presence in Iraq and the Arab peninsula and the presence of the Jews on the land of Palestine,'" Greenberg continues. "They also were, the group asserted, 'a secure place for the filthy Israeli and Western tourists to spread corruption and adultery at the expense and suffering of the Muslims.'"
No mention here of the now scrubbed fact the "filthy Israelis" were tipped off and evacuated the hotel before the black op unit attacked. Moreover, as usual, the blasts killed not only innocent Arabs, but in this instance also "the commander of the Palestinian Special Forces, Bashir Nafeh, Jihad Fatouh, the commercial attaché at the Palestinian Embassy in Cairo, and Mosab Khorma, deputy Chairman of Cairo-Amman Bank in the Palestinian territories and Col. Abed Allun, another high-ranking Preventive Security forces official, were also killed in the three nearly simultaneous suicide bombings on American-owned hotels," according to Rumor Mill News. It sure is odd how al-Zarqawi kills important Palestinians for the Likudites.
Comment: Which brings to mind the other old chestnut, "No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public". Before writing in with irate comments that "Not all Americans are like that!"... we know. Unfortunately, enough are like that to guarantee Fox News, CNN, and even the New York Times, year after profitable year.
And, yes, there are enough people in other countries like that to ensure the situation is dire the world over. In fact, it is their world, the world of those who accept unthinkingly the news they get from the authorities. They seem to be missing some important wiring in their brains that enable them to think critically, to be able to digest the information they receive, rather than simply react to it in a mechanical way.
We're the outcasts and strangers. Who is this "We"? Those who sense that there must be something more to life than fame, money, and sex. Unfortunately, there is no easy way out. Just feeling like a misfit won't do the trick because we are all mechanical and unaware most of the day, even when we are howling that we don't belong in this crazy world where the most horrible crimes are accepted are normal "because it has always been that way" or because "it's just human nature", and as long as we are mechanical and unaware, we fit here perfectly.
Maybe it is their "human nature", but it is not ours, or, rather, it doesn't have to be; some people can attain a contact with their higher nature, their conscience, even if much of the time we have such a feable contact with it that we can often act in ways that are contrary to its warning voice.
Quite the conundrum.
Comment: Which brings to mind the other old chestnut, "No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public". Before writing in with irate comments that "Not all Americans are like that!"... we know. Unfortunately, enough are like that to guarantee Fox News, CNN, and even the New York Times, year after profitable year.
And, yes, there are enough people in other countries like that to ensure the situation is dire the world over. In fact, it is their world, the world of those who accept unthinkingly the news they get from the authorities. They seem to be missing some important wiring in their brains that enable them to think critically, to be able to digest the information they receive, rather than simply react to it in a mechanical way.
We're the outcasts and strangers. Who is this "We"? Those who sense that there must be something more to life than fame, money, and sex. Unfortunately, there is no easy way out. Just feeling like a misfit won't do the trick because we are all mechanical and unaware most of the day, even when we are howling that we don't belong in this crazy world where the most horrible crimes are accepted are normal "because it has always been that way" or because "it's just human nature", and as long as we are mechanical and unaware, we fit here perfectly.
Maybe it is their "human nature", but it is not ours, or, rather, it doesn't have to be; some people can attain a contact with their higher nature, their conscience, even if much of the time we have such a feable contact with it that we can often act in ways that are contrary to its warning voice.
Quite the conundrum.