No jokes in Pakistan...

At ZENmud productions, we've seriously debated whether this line of thought will send assassins to our door...

What happened these last days in Pakistan, seems like a message, but not the kind that the press is discussing on Page ONE.

We're lost, thinking of how Benazir Bhutto's death is the culmination of several intersecting lines of past history and current events. Without the key elements, however (and 'whew!!!' that we don't know those...), the only thing to do is to cast these disparate elements on the table, like I Ching yarrow sticks...


The ELEMENTS:

In 1996 or so, the Taliban were created and installed in Afghanistan, as a means of solidifying a rogue State; the group was trained and exported from Pakistan. Pakistan was then the first State to recognize, diplomatically and officially, the new Afghani government.

As we saw in newsreels, some of which were included in the Michael Moore film FAHRENHEIT 9-11, at about that same time, a pipeline was under discussion between various governments and the US company UNOCAL; Moore showed footage of the Taliban being entertained by Governor GW Bush.

At about the same time that the Taliban refused to dance, on the UNOCAL proposal, or shortly thereafter, the Project for a New American Century (PNAC) was hotting up its rhetoric, calling for a 'Pearl Harbor' type of 'cataclysmic event' that would force US citizens to think differently about foreign policy.

In 1999, Pervez Musharraf became President of Pakistan, in an ingenious coup-d'Etat: while circling over Pakistani soil in a plane, former PM Sharif had refused entry to Musharraf's plane, after a short 'war' with India had gone very much awry. That war, planned by Musharraf, was condemned by the international community, yet! When Musharraf was denied entry by Sharif, that provoked the PK generals to oust Sharif, allowing Musharraf to land with some seven minutes of fuel remaining.

One cannot but include the bin Laden/Bush/Baker/Major connections through the Carlyle Group, a major privately-held US corporation that invests in the machinery of war, and recently has diversified into communications acquisitions.

Bush takes over the US Presidency, from a decision by the US Supreme Court.

Bin Laden (AKA Usama during Clinton's reign, changed to 'Osama' during the Bush administration) makes himself central player of the three Islamic dynamos, being Yassar Arafat, Saddam Hussein, and Usama bin Laden.

Bush creates his first WAR Coalition, to take over the Taliban government, reek havoc on the innocent Afghani people (mostly, and nearly bombed out of existence over the preceding twenty years).

Bush takes Musharraf's offers of support and alliance with the US government, paying a monstrous amount of money annually for Pakistan's help on the "WAR FOR TERROR" (A ZENmud post on that here), from 2001 until today.


IRAQ... sigh...



Throughout these war-wearied years, a dance between Bush, Musharraf and bin Laden has undermined American support of the perpetual Bush war plans... and bin Laden has enjoyed perhaps the longest streak of failures ever displayed by the 'mightiest force on Earth'... due to complicity by any of his partners, whom we can only fear knowing, whether domestically located within the USA, or elsewhere.



AND, reading today about the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, ZENmud productions is left with one recurring thought:

IF Bhutto, an opponent of Musharraf, was assassinated by factions loyal to bin Laden, then there can be no doubt on Earth, that bin Laden is showing gratitude towards his host, as a GUEST, for the luxury of a peaceful existence so near to two US Armed Forces actions, by reducing the Pakistani opposition to 'rubble'.

IF it isn't clear yet, who's playing whom against whom, it could very well be that there is no part of any recent history emanating from these 'Stanistan' countries, that IS as it APPEARS to be.

Is the last series of Pakistan events, rotating between Bhutto's return, the emergency martial law month, and now her assassination, a reward for Musharraf (or his military, or Intelligence Service?), to Musharraf, for his perpetual "We honestly don't know..." responses to those who 'want' to find bin Laden???


SEE ALSO:

The Perverzions of Two Presidencies...

After America, what?

Try this at home...

Courage, as the uncontrollable expands exponentially

ç*””*”*”*ç*””* ZENmud *””*ç*”*”*””*ç

where to, Lakota Nation?

Haumikole! Hello my friend!
Mitaku Oyasin! We are all related!

The friendly words above are a greeting to all from the Lakota Nation, a declaration of independence having been offered to the United States Department of the Interior late in December 2007.

The sons and daughters of famous Native American chieftains - of Sitting Bull, Red Cloud and Crazy Horse, took a giant, world-altering step last week, by declaring the Lakota Nation to exist again, where once their forebears led free lives on land they'd held for many generations.

This is an event of magnificent purport, purpose and projects a new dialogue, long overdue, between the White settlers of the United States, and the Native Americans (although that name seems anachronistic now...) are receiving international attention and early signs of diplomatic support. From Bolivia, Russia and Venezuela, come indications or rumours, of international diplomatic support and, eventually, recognition?



Russell Means, of the Lakota Nation, at the
press conference given on 19 December, 2007.

From the website www.lakotafreedom.com, come these heartwrenching words:

A long time ago my father told me what his father told him. There was once a Lakota Holy man called Drinks Water, who visioned what was to be; and this was long before the coming of the Wasicus.

He visioned that the four-legged were going back into the earth and that a strange race had woven a spider’s web all around the Lakotas. And he said, “When this happens, you shall live in barren lands, and there beside those gray houses you shall starve.”

They say he went back to Mother Earth soon after he saw this vision and it was sorrow that killed him.

Black Elk, Oglala Sioux Holy Man

Lest we forget as a conquering nation, perhaps the only nation that had swallowed its conquests, instead of travelling to other faraway continents, the United States government under Bush the Lesser, is now in an embarrassing position, the kind of which has always brought out the worst in his paranoid, megalomaniacal disposition.

As stated on the Lakota Freedom website, a rumour exists: that Bush is contemplating the withdrawal of financial aid from usual government sources, for Indian community programs found within this proclaimed Lakota territory.

Courage, Native Fathers, from a US citizen who would willingly give you title to your lands.

ç*””*”*”*ç*””* ZENmud *””*ç*”*”*””*ç

The PARODOX of HUMANITY...

Between the Winter Solstice and the Christian holiday of Christmas, is a special time for nearly all of the developed world, as it draws close the year upon us, and brings forward a new year, sometimes more hopeful, sometimes less (Good-bye lyublyu)... But it is the perfect time to unveil the Parodox of Humanity, a crystelZENmud 'wakeup call' for fellow earthbound planet-sharing peoples...

Humanity is the only Species on Earth
Intelligent enough to kill itself off,
and...

Too egotistical not to do so.

Whatever you believe, THIS planet is worth keeping...

I hope OUR Beliefs bring PEACE to some future generation(s)

Good bye, enjoy your holidays, your family, friends and try to live in the reality of our times: it's now, people...

Courage, Mother Earth!

ç*””*”*”*ç*””* ZENmud *””*ç*”*”*””*ç

Momma away

Я тeбя люблю
I love you...

It was nearly two months ago when the call came,
ending her voyage,
eighty-nine tours around the Sun...

Ending an enduring wait,
an enormous weight

The call,
from the state where I last visited my darling mother...

Our shared journey ended, and with her parting breath
the following generation stood on hand.

Where doth she fly?

(December 23, 1917 --- October 29, 2007)

I am and always was her Youngest, last of a series of four boys; our generation really straddles two, the older pair an early-Sixties generation, the second pair found their majority in the 'disco-era', of the post-Nixonian economic 'malaise' that we called the Seventies.

Mom was counterpoint to 'the old man' (ToM), and she was strong in her faith, strong in her beliefs, and especially strong in her inquisitive intellect and moral being: it came naturally, in stark contrast to 'ToM'... and when once I reminded her in Aspen, maybe in 1968 or 69, that the man that had held open the door of the restaurant for her and I, was none other than Stein Erikson, immortal skiing hero from Norway, her heart fluttered a bit, I'm sure...

When she took my other brother and I, to see 'Mr President Nixon' arriving at the local airstrip in New Jersey, I remember fondly how she corrected me, after I offered Dick Nixon my own well-aimed middle-finger salute...

She said “SON! Please! You must respect the Office, even if you cannot respect the man that holds it...”

I've often wonder why it appears that no other American's mother taught them that?

After learning how the media has shifted so far to the right, while Republican politicians still thrill, in berating the 'liberal media' that obviously died in the Clinton era, the crass discourse that has survived, grown stronger and poisoned the new Millennium... Mom you won't be missing much, my dear.



We latter boys, grew up in a Jersey forest of delights, a forest that we never feared, between deer herds and horse stables, swamp lands of the Great Swamp National Wildlife Refuge. and hillside creeks... in the most beautiful part of New Jersey. Hundreds of deer fed off the verdant hillside flora... cycling cross-country to school on the same trails ridden (once or twice a season) by Jackie Kennedy and her crowd...


We grew up, steeped within Early US history, walking the wooded paths where, some 190 years prior, the Continental Army had camped for some 24 months of the Revolutionary War: the Wick House, the lore which included how daughter Tempe had hidden her horse from ransacking British troops, later to ride away and warn the Generals in Morristown... and we as naïve children believed in the heroism of free-fighting colonialists.

Mom, it wasn't until many years later, that I began to find out more of the history of our region. "WAR IS HELL" is not the most recently-coined phrase:

In 1776, the people of Morristown wanted nothing more than to have the army stay in town in order to protect them. When the troops actually did come, however, the townsfolk found they got more than they had bargained for. The soldiers they had hoped would protect them from harm brought with them deadly disease, stole and damaged property, and caused severe overcrowding. Despite the uneasy relationship between Morristown and the military, however, the town’s role was vital to the American cause and part of New Jersey’s vast contribution to the revolution.

This may sound familiar, to any student of foreign occupancies...


Mom, you brought we two boys with you to see A CLOCKWORK ORANGE. back in its original X-rated version, when released in 1971, the manager wouldn't let us in, and you let him know that you thought a mother could and should have the capacity to offer her children a metaphorical journey into the future, as we are witnessing Burgess and Kubrick's prevoyant premonitions of rampant violent decadence in the youth of ... now!

My mother would remember, how she dropped me off to McGovern county headquarters, so I and my lovely friend (sigh...) could stuff some 12,000 envelopes with campaign information. I think we set a record, dear, although the cause was lost: to the man who created the Watergate cover-up... someone once called 1972 'The First Year of the New Millennium', in a clear reference to the political destruction of the American Dream...



Mom, you agreed (groovy....), when my friend and I proposed to travel by hitch-hiking, some 400 miles (700km) to Watkins Glen, in NY State, for the Summer Jam concert of 1973... and better, you convinced the ToM not to oppose this, and you provided us with our first ride, to rocket us up to the Interstate, where our prospects for a long haul were considerably stronger... and when E. and I arrived, to find peace and fun in the midst of 600 thousand hippies - and how we returned on Monday, one (first!) bag of weed and one sunburn later - three cents left in my pocket.

The Grateful Dead, who played twice! Their two hour sound check, the evening before their concert in the late morning... the Allman Brothers' Band, and the BAND...

This generational event, could only but add to my pacifist convictions, Mom, after siding with you against ToM, our racist Republican father, who spewed on the greatness of Nixon, the obvious necessity of fighting Communism by killing babies in Vietnam, the atrocity when HIS university set up an inner-city campus in Newark...


1973...

It became the year of transition, although we didn't even know it yet...


Momma, who watched as another brother took mySelf and a motorcycle off to Nova Scotia, to voyage by ferry, moto to Lunenburg, Halifax, and discuss whether the ToM and I could survive, living in the same house, as violently opposed to one another as are the Shi'ites and Sunnis today... could I survive for the two remaining years of my high school?

A question without answer, but a solution nevertheless, was proposed: and good-bye to the Eastern Liberal upbringing...

Momma, you eventually resettled in Denver, joining the Eldest son for a year or more, in which you decompressed from the mighty weight of the eternal warfare we had waged together, against the ToM, whose alcoholism and other nasty habits (A truer, right-wing Hunter Thompson "FEAR AND LOATHING" personality could hardly be invented) had vanquished much of our spirits... we survived that.

And Momma, I remember when you brought our dog MacDuff to
the foothills above Boulder, Colorado,



... so we could all three say good-bye, to a faithful animal that had cost the price of four tumour operations on your limited budget... his health betrayed his enthusiasm, even as he laboured to cross the rugged terrain, dry under a Colorado sky...


You entered the work force nearly the same year as I did, earning a living as best you could, after being one of the stoic housewives in the last generation that venerated this domain.

The ToM had retired to the mountains, and due to my collapsed program in film studies, while I had suffered to share his digs and earn some film-study money, I stayed, moving beyond the ToM to enjoy my own form of decompressing, as a skier and raft guide, for families and celebrities alike.

Momma, you were so happy when I married, so compassionate through my divorce, and your serious problems started to accrue, in the years after I had left Colorado for the East again, with wife, to create the new and intellectually-broadened son, aiming for a law degree, hoping to go off into the wilds of diplomacy, and write a treaty that helped the world advance in normative law formation... while learning divorce law as an extra-curricular activity, and suffering the same pains as you, to have stayed so long in a negative energy, unloving atmosphere.

Into Europe came I, as you travelled less and read more, an Oprah fan, a liberal of stature, and a inquisitive light always... how much you suffered, watching as Bush the Lesser created his zombie world of terrorist ghouls that were certainly (FOXnews knows) only a mile or less away from KILLING EVERY AMERICAN (NB: HomeSec - this is a joke!) EVERY DAY FOR SEVEN YEARS NOW...

The only thing we have to fear TODAY, Momma, is hearing the word 'fear' itself, broadcasted from the US Government on a 24/7 basis; to win the votes of the fearful, to inhibit healthy campaign discourse on real tangible issues, to motivate the opinion of the media into supporting 'war president' policy chocies...

But as you quietly 'went to sleep' this year, suffering as so many do, the scourge of Alzheimer's, the long-term effects from diseases you'd long vanquished, or held at bay... and I so far away...

Momma, you once told me in the mid-to-late 1990s, as I recall now, that I was the only son that said "I love you Mom" (or 'honey', 'sexy mama', 'darling') with every call; and you noted that I did this EVERY TIME...

But it was only natural to me, after being raised by you... maman, ma petite chèrie... meine Geliebte, I thought it right to break the chains that bound our relationship in the stoic ways of past generations.

Momma, we also saw the film Little Big Man, a Dustin Hoffman classic...

... he who had the Chief as his grandfather... and who certainly gave me a facet of my beliefs, in his memorial line "It is a good day to die..."

Many know this quote... many more do not retain the powerful words that followed... these are words that tie ourSelves together, Momma...

Thank You for making me a Human Being!
Thank You for helpin' me to become a warrior!

Thank You for my victories, and for my defeats!
Thank You for my vision, and the blindness in which I saw further!

You make all things and direct them in their ways, O Grandfather.

And now You have decided the Human Beings will soon walk a road that leads nowhere.

I am gonna die now, unless death wants to fight.

And I ask You for the last time to grant me my old power to make things happen.

Remember, Mom, that to these Cheyenne Indians, the words 'Human Beings' only referred to themselves... Recall how this sequence ends, as Grandfather opens his eyes?

“Am I still in this world?”

Jack Crabb (Hoffman): “Yes, Grandfather.”

“I was afraid of that... Well, sometimes the magic works, sometimes it does not.”

Momma, you helped make the magic work... and nearly three weeks ago, three weeks after your quiet sleep began, I met someone whose heart may beat as mine does... which is why I'll say one more time, in Russian...

Я тeбя люблю
I love you...

NOT good NEWS

Once upon a time, there was a country that had 'EVERYTHING', and it was the envy of the world it shared... and it was warned, by Dwight Eisenhower, in 1960.

Its currency, respected and held around the world, facilitated the purchase of petroleum, especially to power THE CAR.

From T-birds to T-Bonds, the world has been transformed in many ways, during these last forty years, and that tout-puissant country, yet again, is resisting any calls upon it to 'tighten its belt', to arrest the expanding burden it places on a fragile global eco-system, and even worse:

Its currency, the once-almighty DOLLAR, has pistoned its value into the collective toilet, as the GROSS VALUE of AMERICA falls daily.

SIDEBAR: In its 2005 report: WHERE IS THE Wealth of NATIONS? Measuring Capital for the 21st Century (The WORLD BANK, Washington, D. C.), its team of authors established a 'wealth value per capita' for each country on our beautiful planet; the data in this crystelZENmud post comes exclusively from their numbers, and ZENmud productions' own derivative calculations.

If a country, say... Saudi Arabia, wanted to buy the ENTIRE United States: every business, every resource, every personal bank or savings account, every tangible and intangible asset, the World Bank estimated the US total wealth to be roughly USD 14,466.8 BILLION (in 2005 dollars). Based on a population of 282 million persons, this number was equivalent to 'each citizen' having a share in the total wealth, per capita, of 512 thousand dollars (rounded numbers).

In our day, as we near 2008, we also hear that Bush and Congress are agreeing on a 696 BILLION dollar defense budget, for fiscal year (FY) 2008.

What does total wealth and defense spending have to do with each other?

Simply, it points out yet again how disastrous US governmental response has been, perpetually, when regarding the sum of material benefits accruing to the Petroleum-Military-Communications-Industrial-Complex (PMCIC), rather than to the common citizen of our country.

Remember that the Saudis *could* have bought the United States, lock-stock-and-barrel for some 14,466.8 BILLION dollars in 2005. If they had wanted to pay this in Euros, that would mean that the King of SA would have to fork over some 12,354.4 BILLION Euros (given November 2005 exchange rates).

TODAY?

Bargain CITY, my friends, my fellow patriots: the Republicant Party has succeeded, through the amazing drifting spiral of US domestic and foreign policy, in achieving the unthinkable.

Our astute Saudi King, if he had chosen to purchase all of the United States today, would only have to pay 10,406.5 BILLION Euros, and all the while receiving the bonus from economic growth these last two years: likely estimates today, of US total value, should range above 15,000 BILLION dollars.

ANALOGY:

Say you wanted to buy a US-made LEXUS in 2005, after returning from your two-year assignment in Paris, with your hands full of Euros.

Say it cost $50k in 2005. It would have cost you Euro 42,760 for your new car, in November, 2005.

But TODAY?

A $51k car, in the US, priced in Euros, would cost you only Euro 34,744!

And this car analogy is perfect, as we read in the International Herald Tribune from Tuesday, that Alfa Romeo, a division of FIAT, is seriously considering the opening of a production plant in the US, to reintroduce its cars to the American market.

READ THIS CAREFULLY:

European automakers want to SAVE PRODUCTION COSTS.

The cost of an average American auto-worker is now TEN DOLLARS per hour CHEAPER than average Western European countries' labour costs, such as France (Peugeot, Citroën), Germany (Porsche, Mercedes, VW), Italy (Fiat, Ferrari).

European automakers would not be considering massive, expensive relocation of PRODUCTION FACILITIES if they believed that the current sad status of the dollar was going to REVERSE course in the near future.

In only two years, a growing wealth base in the US has now become worth some FIFTEEN percent less (15 %, in EURO terms) than a smaller wealth base would have been two years ago.

And how does the American Eagle feel, about becoming the source of cheaper labour for a strengthening EUROworld?

America cannot ignore the world it shares, via the bias of the media which 'serves' the public. Should it continue to do exactly what it does best: ignore climate change, ignore deficit spending Republicant misAdministrations, and worry more about Michael Vick than the Bali Climate Summit, it can only have itself to blame.

This post is merely a warning... ACT or REACT, America: it's your choice...

Courage,

ç*””*”*”*ç*””* ZENmud *””*ç*”*”*””*ç

Al GORE: the last of the Americans...

In a previous post, ZENmud had endorsed wholeheartedly the winning nomination of Al Gore, former US Vice-president to President Clinton, and gave him a custom, photographic honorarium in commemoration, which we are glad to re-publish today ...

.

From the Nobel Committee website, you can read the full text of a very impressive, impressing, and heartfelt speech, from a man who could have made the past decade much less agonizing, much less deadly, than did his Republicant opponent, GW Bush... sigh - here is an excerpt from climatic expert AL GORE:

We, the human species, are confronting a planetary emergency - a threat to the survival of our civilization that is gathering ominous and destructive potential even as we gather here. But there is hopeful news as well: we have the ability to solve this crisis and avoid the worst - though not all - of its consequences, if we act boldly, decisively and quickly.

Lest we lapse into a giddy euphoria, an acknowledgement is also extended to the Peace Prize-sharing Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), whose outstanding work, in amassing troves of information from organizations and researchers around the world, are also very much worthy of our gratitude.

You can read the full text of Chairman Rajendra Pachauri here.

We cherish your dedication, both to the entire IPCC and Mr Gore.


Given our changing world, with Capitalism having granted to itself sole authority to strip, to mine, to strip-mine, extract, harvest and sell some SEVENTY-FIVE per cent (75 %) of all primary resources, in our and our fathers' lifetimes (since roughly 1880, when the OIL Economy took off), one has to balance the positive with the negative.

The POSITIVE: that commerce-oriented HUMANITY can wrench the destructive momentum of our times and forefathers' activities ...

(SEXISM ALERT: the trends that begat the problems of our gender-neutral epoch, began with the economic rules and practices that were laid down long before the feminist movement acquired its stature, and the gender-equalizing practices of these last forty years or so were no longer 'news')

... through acceptance, modification and adaptation of new commerce means, and avenues for selling wares and services.

Which is Yang... acting to promote a better way forward, towards a Yin and thus a centering future....

The NEGATIVE: remains to be seen on nightly broadcasts of terror reigning down upon ancient civilizations, by younger 'civilizations', whose means of destruction are a disguise for the need to acquire diminishing reserves of resources, turning these into products for sale, to satisfy the most crass and crude short-term 'needs'...

"We do not inherit this world from our parents, we borrow it from our children"
(a quotation that is variously attributed to French authors or Native American Tribal Chiefs)

AND thus decide for yourself, today, what world are you helping them to forge? What lessons that you teach them, will serve them in eighty years?

Walk gently in nature;
Take what you need, but use what you take;
Never harvest the last seed;
Lyublyu every day...

At ZENmud productions, it is useful to note that the thought-process patterns here, have for the first time in this life become multi-generational... there may be a future 'there' there, as Gertrude Stein said (paraphrasing why)...


COURAGE, for the dreams to come into our reality...

ç*”*”*””*ç”*”* ZENmud ”*””*ç*”*”*””*ç”

"...a Kazakhstani state of mind..."

sigh...

Would someone from Kazakhstan know as little about, say, the western slope of Colorado, as ZENmud knows about her country? (photo 1: the great Tien Shan mountain range, northern extension of the Himalayas)


Yet, as the 'great exporter' of film and TV 'messages' for nearly a hundred years, the use by America of its home-grown media as 'cultural software' (a misplaced quote from Hans ____ (to be updated)), one might guess that there are more perceptions available as to 'life in the USA', than are available to those who ponder these majestic lands that make up the Eurasian landmass.

BUT!

Who wouldn't love to visit the land from which Humanity first domesticated the Horse, and which knows one of the oldest strains of wild Apple? (photo 2: the Malus sierversii Kazakh apple)

With a landmass greater than Western Europe, prosperity from natural resources, and .... one fact that ZENresearch knew from years back, is that Kazakhstan is one of the great LAND-LOCKED countries (other than the Caspian Sea); there is no need for a Navy, and thus the country must use pipelines for its natural resources export. (photo 3: lovely Kaindy Lake)


Not to recount boring historical facts sans cesse, but it is interesting to note that the Russian Federation has recently renewed a long term lease on an immense swath of Kazakh territory until 2050, where the Baikonur Cosmodrome is located; this was the scene for all Soviet space launches from Vostok 1 onward.

This leased land is some 6,000 square kilometers (approx 2,300 sq. miles); a zone 60 by 100 km encompasses nearly the same sized terrain as that of the lac Léman basin (Home of ZENmud productions, the UNOG, WIPO and the UCI and IOC) in Switzerland.

Why an interest in Kazakhstan?

Is it an overwhelming interest in our stark and beautiful natural planet?

The enticement of seeing amazingly long-lasted cultures?

A desire to pursue unfulfilled dreams?

Many potential reasons...

One concrete response... a heart beats there... and if I spelled this right:

Я тeбя люблю

ç*””*”*”*ç*””* ZENmud *””*ç*”*”*””*ç