Saturday, August 03, 2002
BRING IT BACK
I find it especially interesting that the three colleges in my area - two universities and one college, to be exact, have not had, but are now adding a regular course in “Political Ethics.”
As we used to say in the hill county where I grew up” “’S’bout time!”
They insist them have mentioned the subject or “touched upon” the subject in many of their political oriented courses and this is no doubt quite accurate, but we have evidence a-plenty in our recent history
which shows our future political leaders might be better acquainted with the simple rules of ethics of all types... business, social, economic and moral - whenever they apply to the art of political mechanizations in which they are being
schooled.
I would hope that a word might be returned to more common usage at the same time. The word is “mendacity”. It’s a term which is not used very much these days and yet so many of our chosen leaders have, I
regret to say, proved themselves to be Masters of Mendacity.
If you need to go to your dictionary to find out what mendacity means, you would will find that, among other things it means the practice of lying, knowingly telling falsehoods, lacking in qualities of veracity in
things you do, or promise to do, plus other shades and shadows of meanings concerning basic untruthfulness or truthlessness.
There can be little doubt but that such conditions exist in our political system. They have, probably, existed for a long time - even for all time - and efforts are now being made to try to eliminate the more flagrant
violations after a lapse of a decade or so in which regulatory authorities looked to other way as much as possible. As with so many qualifications the condition seems to be attached to a pendulum of a sort which, when deftly
“gunned” or “braked” by individuals or groups, can swing from one extreme to the other.
Dan Quayle may have been laughed right out of the White House job years ago when he centered on morality as being a key to our future. Today a great many people who ridiculed his views are saying the very
things he did.
Regardless of your political affiliations, it seems wise for all of us to consider this an especially good time as an opportunity to “get our act together” and earnestly attempt to clean out some of the dead wood
which clutters the floor of our political forests. The accumulations of rotting leaves in the form of lies and deceitful practices, false accounting and sham corporations, must be cleared if we are to have any assurance of preventing
more highly destructive and costly wildfires in the future.
I would hope the colleges and universities are adding courses in ethics for Banking and Business School studies as well. Politics is not the only area where reform is needed.
A.L.M. Aug. 3, 2002 [c498wds]
Friday, August 02, 2002
TO BE FREE
Most of us rarely think of the special freedoms we enjoy in these United States of
America.
We become aware of them from time to time when we are forced to do so by world
events. The news tells us that other people do not enjoy freedoms we take for granted
and, at such moments, we begin to think about the security of our own beliefs. There are
always some individuals who doubt the continued existence of our valued freedoms, too.
So often, they are loud, insistent voices which come to us in the slyest guises through one
or more of the many flexible facets of a vibrant media surrounding us on all side.
In Revolutionary times the scattered locations of the citizenry and the polyglot
nature of their folkloric backgrounds caused many to respond to the idea of
independence in varied ways, not always in the agreement with separatists.
Many did not wish to leave what, to them, seemed the great security of belonging
to the British Empire. Many must have though seriously of the impending conflict with the
Indian tribes which occupied the lands toward the west into which they were to expand.
They worried, too, I would imagine, about the French in Canada, the Mississippi and New
Orleans and Spanish influences in Florida, the Caribbean Islands and the rim thereof
around that Sea and the Gulf of Mexico. Who could best protect their possessions if war
should come with any of those factions? Certainly not a ragtag militia from the colony
with which they happened to be associated.
Later when the rebels became more active, many of king-minded settlers either
returned to England, moved the Scottish Nova Scotia settlements or to other parts of
Eastern Canada. Other chose to exist in Tory enclaves in rebel areas. And, there also was
a large group of people who did not care which way it all went, as well as those who
looked for ways to profit from whichever way it might seem to be going. Not all were what
we like to think of as “patriots.”
Our freedoms have been bought, not only by the blood of thousands those who
have died in the various wars we have met with, but also those individuals and groups
who, between such moments of obvious crisis, maintained firm moral standards against
great obstacles of a rough, frontier lifestyle and tried to live in keeping within the best of
the religious concepts of the time.
Lest we come to think that all honor for having won and held our freedom belongs
to militant individuals, we might all profit from looking at the average person of Colonial
and Revolutionary times. Our freedoms were won by those who entered the fray in a
physical sense, of course, but we must not forget they were sustained and their victories
made possible by the sacrificial support of, for example, farmers - men, women and
children; by the formative industrial workers of that day,- men, women and children
giving their every awakened hour to provide critical support for the military - all working
together to forward the causes they and their leaders believed in so strongly at that time.
We might realize, too - the children, in particular, might have worked without knowing the
real value of what they were doing. Much of it might have been a way of assuring
themselves that their father, husband, son, brother or relative in the armed forces might
have a better chance of returning to them, or simply because they needed a means of
staying alive themselves in trying times.
We need to be reminded that our freedoms today were each and items purchased
by someone who did without them for a time..of a long time ... so that we might enjoy
living security, independence and also be so wondrously blessed in so many ways.
A.L.M. June 23, 2002 [c655wds]
Thursday, August 01, 2002
DON’T MESS AROUND WITH JAGUARS
The ancient Mayan word for Jaguar was spelled and pronounced “eesh”.
That, of course, is an assumption because it has been a while since we heard any ancient Mayans say anything, much less to talk about one of their favorite beasts.
The eesh was quite important to them in many ways, and a few of them still roam throughout the southwestern United States, and more plentifully in Central America and parts of South America, as well. It is on
not, by any means “extinct”, or about to become so.
The shamanistic lore of the Mayan people thought of the eesh as “the earth father” and the spots on his dark hide are said to be symbolic of the stars in the heavens above.
The Jaguar, as seen by Shaman practitioners today is viewed as that one who presides over the various powers of the Earth planet. This spotted panther is regarded and revered as the Totem Spirit of the Sky
God.
Our literature has, perhaps, been unfair by emphasizing gruesome human sacrifices and that sort of graphic thing when we speak of Maya Jaguar Priests, known as “Shamans”. Theirs was a rather complex and
intricate set of beliefs It is true, of course, that the ancient teachings of the Sky God were perverted and abused by subsequent generations but to see the a civilization as nothing more than a savage barbarism, at best, is a improper
and unfair view.
It is said that the Great Being came down from the stars and taught the Mayan people that the greatest of all virtues was integrity. He instructed them in unconditional love and forgiveness, peace and how to
be honorable and trustworthy. His teaching of a person having a sacrificial heart, a willingness to give freely of one’s self and to share one’s physical holdings to the benefit of the individual and of the community. Those basic
teachings were perverted in the generations which follow as the Mayan nation declined and as Europeans first witnessed it. It is thought that the concept of a “sacrificial heart”, for instance, was taken literally by renegade teachers,
and by a strange twist, turned into a bloody sacrifice in which the heart of a victim was extracted from the body and presented to the Jaguar spirit with hope of appeasing the Sky God. Instead of being pleased with such actions,
the Sky God was angry. To let people know such ways were not a part of his teachings the Sky God sent the Jaguar spirit to prowl the dreams of the “two-legged”. Where ever the Jaguar Spirit found hearts which had been
blackened by hatred, dishonesty or greed he would haunt them, relentlessly, unmercifully until they repented and with ceasing until the repented and reinstated integrity in their transformed lives.
If you meet with a Jaguar let it pass by. Make sure he is merely fishing in a mountain stream, which, I am told, they like to do, and not stalking you for some mis-deed you’d rather not talk about.
Don’t mess around with the “eesh”. Instead, rethink your own ideas of integrity, love and peace.
A.L.M. July 29, 2002 [c534 wds]
Wednesday, July 31, 2002
FAST AIR
People who make serious, scientific tests and studies, and who should know about
such things, tell me that when I sneeze . . . just a simple ker-choo, mind you, it could be
that I am expelling air from my insides with true hurricane force . . . anywhere from
seventy-five miles per hour up to a as much as an impressive one hundred. That would
say my sniffle is just a Tropical Depression, I suppose, forming up to become the real thing.
But, you think those speeds are a bit too high, wait until you hear what I am
supposed to be doing when I decide to cough, or cough, because I don’t think many
people sit around deciding if they are going to cough or not. We teach our children to
stifle their cough or sneeze by placing a hand o handkerchief over their mouths and nose,
but that may just be inviting disaster, in one sense, because the force with which a cough
expels air from our lungs might blow that handkerchief back to the cotton fields or break
the kid’s fingers.
When a person coughs, studies indicate, the human body, on average, expels air
from the respiratory system at a rates which vary from up to three hundred miles per hour!
Now, I’m among those clucks who would laugh if a “Flat Earth Believer - yes there
are still quite few of them around - asked a dumb question like: ”If the Earth is a round ball,
how come we don’t fall off?” Right at this point I’m wondering if I should ask those high
speed wind experts: “H’come, if I sneeze at up to a hundred mile so per hour speeds and
cough at up to three hundred miles per hour, as you say we do, h’come we’re not all
plastered up against the wall next to the ceiling somewhere by simple jet expulsion
reaction? Heaven help the person who sneezes while outdoors or coughs several times!
Maybe that what has happened to some of the “missing person” persons on police
blotters all over the country.
Seriously, though, the force with which we expel air in an effort to force out foreign
bits from our respiratory system’s narrow passages is astonishingly high. I doubt if may
sneeze and cough meters record those reaching the upper levels cited for shock value in
writing or talking about it, but it can still prove to e remarkably fast.
We should not ignore a cough or a sneeze because it identifies a problem or a
potential one. I know it should be treated with seriousness, but one of the comedy acts I
remember most is one we used to see, primarily in what were called “Short Subjects” at
our local movie theaters. A fat fellow by the name of Jack Smart used to do a comedy
routine on various types and sizes of sneezes. His waxy little mustache wiggled and helped
out a great deal in his sneezing demonstration which always seemed to get out of hand
and become orgies. Jack Smart was one of the few comedians who, literally, left me rolling
on the floor trying to contain my painful laughter. I have even been driven to leaving the
room to live to tell about it. I thought of Smart’s sneezes when I read about the sneeze
and cough speeds recently. He did little puffs, summer breezes, high, winds, gales,
tornadoes, monsoons, hurricanes - all of them, and each one was funnier than half of any
previous one.
For some strange reason, I tend to associate Jack Smart as being a vocalist with
“Ted Fiorito and His Orchestra.” Can anyone tell me if I am wrong in doing so? He also did
some sneeze-bit parts in several movies, I’m sure.
Pardon me a moment....(Sound effect).
There! That’s better! Much better!
A.L.M. July 28, 2002 [652wds]
Tuesday, July 30, 2002
BUY U.S.A!
Can you actually bring yourself to refuse to buy anything manufactured outside the
United States?
You may do so, if you wish, but have your tried to do so recently? Before you go
making any rash, blanket statements on the matter, check the shelves at your local
merchant’s to see if essentials you want and need are provided with “Made in U.S.A.
labels attached.
Check shoes, for instance. Examine footwear for men, women and children and see
how many you find which are made here in the States. Oh, you may well recognize the
name as being one you remember for many years past, but when you look inside you find
that the firm making them has long since departed these shores.
China produces more shoes, I think, than just about anyone, and I take great pride
in pointing out that a pair of black dress shoes I wear - a well-known brand name shoe -
are not made in China. Of course not! They are, instead, made in India and have been for
some years.
The movement overseas has been a gradual thing but it is becoming quite
noticeable when you shop for the family’s needs.
So many articles of clothing are made in China, Korea, India, Taiwan, and I wear a
plaid sports shirt which was manufactured, not in Scotland, but in Bangladesh, which I
now find I can’t be sure I can even spell correctly. We used to see a lot of things “Made in
Hong Kong” but that was a well-established bit of politically-correct merchandising which
disappeared when Hong Kong reverted to Red China several year ago. It was an open
secret for many years that much, or most, the item we bought “Made in Hong Kong”
were actually made in China and “distributed” through Hong Kong’s established
world-wide trading firms.
Subtle little tricks are commonly used to misguide a trusting and gullible public. One
New York firm which marketed ladies’ gloves imported a line of fancy gloves from Italy.
The gloves where, as far as they knew, actually made in Italy, but before they were
marketed here, a narrow lace trim was stitched to the edge of each glove, bearing the
tiny label which, was, technically quite accurate and true when it attested to the fact
that the lace trim was “Made the U.S.A.”
Much of our electronic products origination moved to Mexico and the Orient many
years ago; to Mexico mainly in the assembly phase, but to the Orient for manufacture of
the television sets, computers, monitors, printers and other such gadgets such a
photographic equipment, supplies and attachments on which we depend so widely
today.
If you think you can get toys and such things for the children come Christmas or
birthday occasions and you expect the toys to be home-made...i.e. in the U. S. of A, you
had best think again!. Even “Lincoln Logs” are made in China these days.
One has to wonder what it might be like once free trade markets really opens up
with China. I wonder, too, if this Chinese merchandise “invasion” has hit European markets
with the same depth that we see here.
A.L.M. July 17, 2002 [c536wds]
Monday, July 29, 2002
THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE PATOLA.
If you are among those of us who have wondered where the Dalai Lama calls
“home” when he is not exiled to some strange place elsewhere on Earth, his address is,
normally, “The Patola Palace” It is located high above the Lhasa Valley in Tibet, which is
about as remote as one can get other than Antarctica, I suppose.
The Patola is a old house. It’s been ”in the family” for many years and it has had -
some may say “suffered” - many additions and modifications over the centuries. The first
house to be built on a hill 170-meters above the Valley floor, which is, itself, high enough to
make things come to a boil slower in the kitchen., was finished in 637 A.D. It was palace,
really, but not much of it is evident in the present dwelling. It is said to have been used in
the foundations for subsequent erections. The Emperor Songtsen Gampo built the
dwelling on top of a hill which was said to have within it a sacred cavern. Therein dwelt
Bodhissartva Chenresi, so Emperor Gampol used it as Meditation Retreat. That original
building stood until the seventeenth century, oddly enough, at which time - in 1645,
during the region of the fifth Dalai Lama, it was obliterated. It took only a few years and
the “Potrang Karpo” - or “white house” - was completed. The next addition called the
“red house” or “Potrang Karpo” and it was added between 1690 and 1694.
You may wonder, as I did, how they managed to get their home improvement
work done so rapidly...three or four years ...when others took half a century, or more go get
things for occupancy. The Dalai Lama must have had a rather good relationships with
the labor union local of his time, because he used seven thousand “workers” plus and
one-thousand five hundred “artists” and “craftsmen” to make the place livable.
The latest revisions of any consequence were in 1922 when the 13th Dalai Lama
renovated some of the chapels and assembly halls in the White Palace and added two
more stories to the Red Palace section.
Fortunately, the three in one palace...counting the first house in the foundations...
suffered little damage during Tibetan uprisings again invading Chinese forces in the l960’s
and 70’s. It is said that Chou En Lai intervened personally to see that the relics of the
palace were not harmed. So, the chapels and the artifacts of the palace are reported to
be well preserved, even though the Dalai Lama is not “in residence”.
The multi-level construction called ”The Petola Palace is named after a holy place
in southern India called Mount Patola in southern India said to have been the abode of a
leading religious figure with a name longer than the mountain range It come to an end
with: ”Kuan Yin” for identification purposes herein. The Emperor Gampo, in the 7th
Century was regarded as an incarnation the Indian deity. It is likely it was he who named
his version of the palace “Petola” after the sacred mountain.
When the Dalai Lams ruled Tibet the Palace was a busy place. It’s 130,000 square
meter interior housed the Tibetan Government, the Dalai Lama’s large staff, a training
school for Monks and a special shrine housed in one ot the White Palace’s two impressive
chapels which lured thousands of Tibetan pilgrims to the holy shrine each day.
Photographs of the palace seldom do it justice, I feel. Often the whole
accumulation seems ready to come scudding down the steep mountain side in a mix of
red and white mortar. But, to the Dalai Lama, wherever he may be tonight.... be it ever
so tumbly, there’s no place like Patola.
A.L.M. July 27, 2002 [c635wds]
Sunday, July 28, 2002
ON BEING A SCOT
Is it true what they say about pixies, the little people, and a host of such
special characters in Irish writings and lore? Well, “yes” and “no.” Facts are
difficult to come by on such subjects.
What about tartans, kilts, and other articles considered to
be natural with the Scot? There is now a fine book available which provides
trustworthy information about these items.
I have always felt these ideas to be too neatly ordered and codified -
overly-documented, if you will, to be “authentic” at all times, and I have
recently met with this remarkable book which set my mind at rest on many
questionable pieces of Celtic lore.
Arthur Herman in his excellent book which is modestly titled: “How The
Scots Invented the Modern World” with a subtitle: ”The True Story of How
Western Europe’s Poorest Nation Created Our World and Everything
In It. ” ...answers many questions.
What about the wearing of kilts?
Yes, the Scot Highlander had long worn skirt-like garments which was
not at all unusual expect that others worn long robes or tight breeches and
the active Scot living in a country of rugged terrain, liked to have his limbs
free and unencumbered with robes or pantaloons for quick defense
response and for attack. The kilt is a very practical garment. At one time,
when the British tried to forbid the wearing of kilts by Scottish troops, among
the communicaions of disapproval arriving at the Ministry of Defense office,
in London, was a scathing letter in which the author - a military man
speaking bluntly and passionately - pointed out, among other advantages,
that the kilts were easier washed because all that was needed was for the
order to be given to walk the troops through waist high and the flapping of
the skirt would dry the fabric out as they continued the march on dry land.
If the troop was encamped the soldier could wash his kilt, his body and legs
and be ready to move out speedily. That short, shoulder strapped combat
kilt was called the feileadh-beag. There were more formal, longer kilts for
social functions and show, but the warring Scot worn them short and the
fabric used was the common cloth of the realm in those days called woven
in tartan designs.
We have been often deluded with regard to those tartan patterns, as
well. It is quite possible that highlander in a certain clan area might be
wearing kilts of the same plaid design. Many sets of kilts could be fashioned
out of a single bolt of fine wool materials and, since weaving was a local
affair, each area tended to do a certain pattern and seldom tried anything
different.
Wilson’s of Brannockburn, wool manufactures, took orders for tartans,
and before long they offered “setts” of tartans in groups named after
various clans or families. The real mark of identify for the clans was worn on
the hat or arm, a spring of juniper identified the MacLeod; that of heather
marked the MacIntyre. The army started the practice of tartan
classification. The celebrated Black Watch was the first unit to do so in 1739
when they selected a somber blue, green and black plaid. The more formal
kilt consisted of twelve yards of pleated material belted around the waist.
And, comments writer Herman ,“the louder the better.”
This important book about the Scots by Arthur Herman is, I would say,
required reading for everyone with Scottish ancestry. The claims he makes
become more and more acceptable as one reads. It made me proud to
have a Scottish background. In covers not only the good things about
Scottish history but also the less admirable occurrences. My particular family
came into The Minch area around 1050 A. D. from Norway, and when I read
detailed portions of unpleasant things, I’m glad to have an “out” and can
think of my family as sojourners merely passing through Scotland for several
centuries on our way to America in the 1730’s.
A.L.M. July 6, 2002 [c679wds]
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