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Wednesday, April 09, 2003
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Duane Elgin writes: The first opportunity trend that could transform our impending crash into a spectacular bounce is a shift in our shared view of the universe—from thinking of it as dead to experiencing it as alive. In regarding the universe as alive and ourselves as continuously sustained within that aliveness, we see that we are intimately related to everything that exists. This startling insight—that we are cousins to everything that exists in a living, continuously regenerated universe—represents a new way of looking at and relating to the world and overcomes the profound separation that has marked our lives. From the combined wisdom of science and spirituality is emerging an understanding that could provide the perceptual foundation for the diverse people of the world to come together in the shared enterprise of building a sustainable and meaningful future. For some, a shift in perception may seem so subtle as to be inconsequential. Yet, all of the deep and lasting revolutions in human development have been generated from just such shifts. (04/09/03) | |
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Dan Gillmor writes: Maybe I'm projecting my own worries onto others. But I sensed a deepening fear that things are really different this time. Liberties ebbed and flowed in America's past. Leaders curbed liberties, with the public's often ignorant endorsement, in times of crisis. But the rights tended to come back when the crises ended. The fabled pendulum of liberty may not swing back this time. Why? For one thing, the damage that one evil or deranged person or group can cause has grown. Even if America somehow persuades all Islamic radicals that we are a good and just society, there will still be some evil and deranged people who will try to wreck things and lives in spectacular ways. In other words, the ``war on terrorism'' can't possibly end. Moreover, the architecture of tomorrow is being embedded with the tools of a surveillance society: ubiquitous cameras; the creation and linking of all manner of databases; insecure networks; and policies that invite abuse. They are being put into place by an unholy, if loose, alliance of government, private industry and just plain nosy regular folks. (04/09/03) | |
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The Nation -- As the war began, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld promised a "campaign unlike any other in history." What he did not plan or expect, however, was that the peoples of earth--what some are calling "the other superpower"--would launch an opposing campaign destined to be even less like any other in history. Indeed, Rumsfeld's campaign, a military attack, was in all its essential elements as old as history. The other campaign--the one opposing the war--meanwhile, was authentically novel. In the pages that follow, The Nation gives a snapshot of it in fourteen countries. If news has anything to do with what is new, then this campaign's birth and activity are the real news. What emerges is a portrait of a world in resistance. Although there is an abyss of difference between the means of the two campaigns, there are also a few notable similarities. Both are creatures of the Information Age, which underlies the so-called "smart" technology on display in the war as well as the Internet, which has become the peace movement's principal organizing tool. Both are global--the United States seeks to demonstrate its self-avowed aim of global military supremacy, and the peace movement is equally determined to reject this. Not only is the whole world watching, as people used to say, the whole world is defending itself. Yet both campaigns are at the same time surprisingly agile, able to change their tactics and timing in response to events. Most interesting, perhaps, both conceive of power at least as much in terms of will as of force. (04/09/03) | |
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Synergy is "energy that expands through cooperation." A power is generated in cooperative endeavors which far exceeds the capabilities of any individual acting alone. Synergy is a way in which the Universal Mind rewards loving relationships, especially those which are in purposeful service to the greater whole. Synergy is a key to the geometric expansion of consciousness . . . The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. (04/09/03) | |
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The enlightened efforts of generations of democrats, the terrible experience of two world wars...and the evolution of civilization have finally brought humanity to the realization that human beings are more important than the state. - Vaclav Havel (04/09/03) | |
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U.S. Government -- Researchers, genealogists and the plain curious can now use the Internet to check more than 50 million historical records at the National Archives, from Civil War battles to family immigration files. Before the system became available, people had to either visit the Archives and spend hours combing through documents or request the files by phone and pay to have them mailed. "Now, people can pull these electronic records at their own convenience," said Michael Carlson, electronic and special media records director for the archives. "It's totally self-service from your desktop." (04/09/03) | |
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BBCi -- After World War I, the oil companies carved up Iraq. Shell, BP, Exxon and Total all had stakes in the Iraq Petroleum Company. They paid pennies for each barrel of oil and built a pipeline to take it away. In 1972 the Iraqis nationalised the industry and threw the foreigners out. From then on Western oil companies could only dream of Iraq’s oil reserves - the second largest in the world. With Saddam Hussein came decades of war followed by sanctions and Iraq's massive reserves lay largely untouched. But with Hussein's regime under threat, at last there was a chance to get back in. ... It's not greed that’s driving big oil companies - it's survival. The rate of oil discovery has been falling ever since the 1960's ... In America, always the greediest consumer of oil, production has been falling for 30 years. Americans guzzle 20 million barrels of oil a day, but now they have to import over 60% of it. That pattern is being repeated elsewhere. Geologist Dr Colin Campbell predicted a decline in the North Sea several years ago and claims by 2015 Britain may have to import over half its oil needs. "In 1999 Britain went over the top and is declining quite rapidly," he says. (03/09/03) | |
6:01:25 AM 
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© TrustMark
2003
Timothy Wilken.
Last update:
5/1/2003; 8:14:13 AM.
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