New stories: When the economics of happiness meets the desperation of not having healthcare

Last week I attended an "Economics of Happiness" conference here in Berkeley and heard Charles Eisenstein speak. "I see the world shifting from a profit-taking economy to a gift economy, from an economy of 'how can I take the most?' to 'how can I best give of my gifts?' This future, in which the anxiety of 'making a living' no longer drives us, will arise out of the transformation in the human sense of self that is gathering today." http://www.ascentofhumanity.com/text.php

Eisenstein also talked about how the availability of unlimited resources has now come to an end. "A monetary system based on growth is now obsolete," and we can no longer destroy resources at will without suffering dire consequences.

"It's like my son Jimmy, who grew two inches one year and five inches the next. This was appropriate to his age. But to continue to grow two inches a year for the rest of his life? Not appropriate. And now that he has reached adulthood and no longer grows, what should we do? Frack him?"

Eisenstein next talked about "old stories" and "new stories". "Economies based on money and material growth have become 'old stories,' ones that simply don't work any more." And a new story, based on the economics of happiness, is becoming more common as monetized economies continue to fail and become obsolete.

Eisenstein next described his idea of a gift economy, based on meeting basic mutual needs through cooperation. "That's why poor people can sometimes be happier than rich people -- because the poor need to gift each other in order to survive; this gifting process then creates a bond; and bonding leads to happiness."

Eisenstein could be right about this, although since I've never been rich, I'm not in any position to compare. However, a recent world-wide "happiness" index showed that materially-deprived Cuba is currently ranked number seven on the happiness scale -- while materially successful America is now ranked 114, far below even Israel and Palestine, and even below Iraq and the DRC.

But what exactly does a gift economy look like? I found a perfect example of one last week while attending a four-day "Remote Area Medical" event at the Oakland Coliseum http://www.ramusa.org, when hundreds of medical professionals offered up their time and knowledge for free so that over 4,000 patients without health insurance could be seen and treated.

That's 1,100 treatments per day.

Cavities were filled, eyes were examined, medical diagnoses were made, etc. Acupuncture, chiropractic, you name it, was provided. It was AMAZING.

As one medical provider stated, "R.A.M. was first designed to provide these services to people in third-world countries -- but it soon became obvious that, if you could not afford health insurance, medical care in America was at the same level as most of the Third World. And so R.A.M. started coming to the United States as well. Our politicians should be ashamed that they've let the quality and availability of American healthcare sink so low that R.A.M has to pick up the slack."

This medical professional had just volunteered to spend her entire weekend gifting her community. And was she happy about it? You bet!

PS: I got to the Coliseum too late to get my teeth looked at (the lines for that service had started forming four days before) but a trailer staffed by Volunteers of America was still offering free HIV testing -- so I did that instead.

A VoA staff member swabbed my mouth, let my saliva sit in a test kit for 20 minutes and then told me I didn't have HIV. "Have you used any dirty needles or had sex recently?" No and no.

"HIV is only transmitted through blood, semen and per-ejaculatory liquids, vaginal fluids and breast milk," I was told.

"But what about through saliva?" Usually not -- unless there's a cut in the mouth.

AIDS and HIV treatments have changed a lot in the last 20 years. "There are now medications that, if patients keep taking them regularly, can allow them to lead a fairly normal life." That's incredibly good news. "But uninfected people still need to take precautions to avoid being exposed to the HIV virus -- such as not using dirty needles and always using condoms."

Next, apparently in the spirit of the economics of happiness, the VoA staffer then gifted me with a whole handful of condoms. "Sorry, but my glory days of creating that kind of happiness are long past," I sadly replied.

PPS: Here are some examples of how to change all our dreary old stories into new, better and more appropriate ones:

Old story: Modern man's brave conquest of nature is achieved by heroically chopping down every tree in sight and putting a car or two in every driveway. And exactly why is this old story now obsolete? Scientific American has just announced that global warming will be irreversible in just eight years unless we immediately change our outmoded ways. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=global-warming-close-to-becoming-ir

New story: Nature is our friend. We protect her and she protects us. Stop driving. Buy locally. Plant trees. The Lorax is back!

Old story: My sister apparently hates me and I, in response, tend to hate her right back.

New story: My sister loves and forgives me and I love and forgive her too. (Realistically, however, it doesn't look like this particular fairy tale is gonna come true any time soon -- but it should. One can hardly tell a new and hopeful story about having peace in the world when one is still having difficulties even loving and/or forgiving one's very own sister.)

Old story: Eva Kor and her twin sister were brutally starved and tortured at Auschwitz, victims of Josef Mengele's notorious twins project.

New story: Kor chose to forgive her tormentors -- and then she did. "Forgive your worst enemy. It will heal your soul and set you free." Kor then established the CANDLES Holocaust Museum in Terre Haute, Indiana. "CANDLES strives for the elimination of hatred and prejudice from our world. CANDLES pursues this goal through education about the Holocaust and the power of forgiveness." http://www.candlesholocaustmuseum.org/index.php?sid=57

The elimination of hatred? That's a new story we could all use. Or, to paraphrase Eisenstein, "As the shell of our old world cracks, then new light can shine in -- and the only antidote to despair is to hope. If we are to continue to survive as a species, we must constantly invent new stories of hope."

PPPS: My friend Barbara just sent me a link to her son Jake's live-streaming video from his Occupy Wall Street current location. Yay Jake! http://www.ustream.tv/channel/jrozlive

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Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare dollar. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

****
Please vote for me to win a scholarship to the 2012 Netroots Nation convention in Providence, Rhode Island in June. Please vote here: http://www.democracyforamerica.com/netroots_nation_scholarships/1444-jane-stillwater

****
Need an actor to play an older woman in your movie? Then I'm your man! I can portray all kinds of older women -- from judges, business execs and other insane zombies to bag ladies, cancer patients, kindly grandmothers and dying patients in rest homes. I've played them all. So send me a script and let's do this. Hollywood, here we come!

****
Are you a plaintiffs' attorney who is tired of writing those pesky personal injury settlement briefs all the time? No problem! I can write them for you. Years of experience. And pay me only if you win the case.

****
Fortune Telling: If you scan a photocopy of the lifeline on the palm of your dominant hand, e-mail it to me at jpstillwater(at)yahoo.com with "Madame Jane" in the subject line, and then slip five dollars into my PayPal account, I can (and will) get Madame Jane to tell you approximately how long you are gonna live -- and also have her throw in some stuff about quality-of-life as well.

****

I recently got my Notary Public commission!

Need a Notary Public? Have seal, will travel. E-mail me at jpstillwater@yahoo.com and I'll stamp your document, make it official and only charge $10. Of course if you live outside of Berkeley, I may have to charge travel expenses -- but am well worth it!

****

Want something good to read? Buy my book! "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips for Touring Today's Middle East," available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. http://www.amazon.com/Bring-Your-Own-Flak-Jacket/dp/0978615719/ref=cm_pdp_rev_itm_title_1. It's like if Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain and/or Janet Evanovich went to war.

I also wrote a book about going on Hajj (also included as a chapter in "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket," but this book is cheaper -- but it's worth buying them both!) My book on the Hajj is so outstanding that I bet even Christian fundamentalists will love it! Please buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/Mecca-Hajj-Lessons-Islamic-School/dp/0978615700/ref=cm_rdp_product

****

"Imagine a world where EVERY child is wanted, nurtured, protected and loved: World peace in one generation!" You can now buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for parents and teachers. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters



"Life is a competition. The winners are the ones who do the most good deeds." You can also buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for those of us who are still idealists in these troubled times. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters

Corporate Goliaths: Have they now become unstoppable?

When David went up against Goliath back in the Bible, Goliath was really truly HUGE. But just how did this guy manage to get that big in the first place? I'm assuming that he started out by eating up everything in sight. At first his mommy probably fed him. But as he grew larger, he started grabbing his weaker neighbors' food for himself. And as he continued to get more massive, he started getting more greedy -- and he soon wanted it ALL. All of it. All of it for him. Nothing for anyone else.

And that's when David stepped in.

American and international corporate giants have become very much like the old biblical Goliath. So here we are today, getting sucked up by their endless appetites, like we were Skittles or potato chips or something -- but there are no modern-day Davids in sight.

In both America and worldwide, these corporate Goliaths have kept growing and growing. How? By lowering our wages so that they can make more profit at our expense, seizing ownership of our media so they can get us to believe that what they're doing is right, and taking over our government so that it can happily feed these monsters our lifeblood.

These snowballing Goliaths have taken over our armies, our treasury, our healthcare, our food, our regulatory systems, our ability to be industrially self-sufficient, our churches and synagogues, even our children's future, and are pushing all of it into their endlessly massive gaping maws. Yuck. And the more money and resources that the corporatists take, the weaker the rest of us become.

Have these Goliaths finally grown large enough to become completely unstoppable? Surely, even against such great odds, there must be SOME way to stop this vast, terrifying and still-growing avalanche of Goliaths? But how? Perhaps by finding another source of power, something beyond what they consider important? Perhaps their unwieldy Goliath model has become outmoded? Perhaps they too can be slain by an opposing avalanche of nimble Davids?

It worked back in Biblical days. Why not now?

Since the advent of the internet, what it means to be a society has changed. What it means to be an individual has changed. What it means to be a country has changed. We are no longer powerless and alone. And we too can become Davids. We can do this. We are doing this already.

PS: Just look at what happened to one of the first Goliaths to fall: Rush Limbaugh.

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Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare dollar. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

****
Need an actor to play an older woman in your movie? Then I'm your man! I can portray all kinds of older women -- from judges, business execs and other insane zombies to bag ladies, cancer patients, kindly grandmothers and dying patients in rest homes. I've played them all. So send me a script and let's do this. Hollywood, here we come!

****
Are you a plaintiffs' attorney who is tired of writing those pesky personal injury settlement briefs all the time? No problem! I can write them for you. Years of experience. And pay me only if you win the case.

****
Fortune Telling: If you scan a photocopy of the lifeline on the palm of your dominant hand, e-mail it to me at jpstillwater(at)yahoo.com with "Madame Jane" in the subject line, and then slip five dollars into my PayPal account, I can (and will) get Madame Jane to tell you approximately how long you are gonna live -- and also have her throw in some stuff about quality-of-life as well.

****

I recently got my Notary Public commission!

Need a Notary Public? Have seal, will travel. E-mail me at jpstillwater@yahoo.com and I'll stamp your document, make it official and only charge $10. Of course if you live outside of Berkeley, I may have to charge travel expenses -- but am well worth it!

****

Want something good to read? Buy my book! "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips for Touring Today's Middle East," available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. http://www.amazon.com/Bring-Your-Own-Flak-Jacket/dp/0978615719/ref=cm_pdp_rev_itm_title_1. It's like if Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain and/or Janet Evanovich went to war.

I also wrote a book about going on Hajj (also included as a chapter in "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket," but this book is cheaper -- but it's worth buying them both!) My book on the Hajj is so outstanding that I bet even Christian fundamentalists will love it! Please buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/Mecca-Hajj-Lessons-Islamic-School/dp/0978615700/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1238806637&sr=1-2

****

"Imagine a world where EVERY child is wanted, nurtured, protected and loved: World peace in one generation!" You can now buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for parents and teachers. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters



"Life is a competition. The winners are the ones who do the most good deeds." You can also buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for those of us who are still idealists in these troubled times. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters

Palestinian children: Born in captivity

Suppose that you are a cute little baby panda or an adorable newborn lion cub that has been born inside a zoo. What happens to you next? Most likely, you will grow up in a zoo and die in a zoo.

But human babies are different from animal babies. It is against the law to keep human babies caged up in a zoo.

Even homeless poverty-stricken American pregnant women who have been sent to jail for whatever -- after giving birth behind bars, even their children aren't forced to remain in captivity and caged up like their moms. Americans are much more humane than that.

Even the poor Sudanese refugee Lost Boys weren't allowed to be caged. Thousands of them were given good educational opportunities and offered good homes in the United States.

Even the approximately seven million Afghan and Iraqi orphans created by Bush, Cheney and Obama are still being allowed a modicum of freedom once in a while http://www.afceco.org/.

But Palestinian children? No such luck. They are born in captivity, they grow up in captivity and they die in captivity -- just because someone else wants their land.

But even sadder still is the fact that most zoo animals are treated more humanely than Palestinian children. Palestinian children's keepers think nothing of shooting, bombing, starving and siccing dogs on these captive kids, housed in open-air prisons such as Gaza and Ni'lin. Captive baby lions and pandas never have to endure anything even remotely as horrible as this.

PS: A lot of folks in America are currently very upset right now because of Joseph Kony's war crimes against children in mineral-rich Uganda http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-march-12-2012/my-little-kony -- but am I the only person on FaceBook today who also gets upset when Bush, Obama, AIPAC, the U.S. Congress and Netanyahu commit war crime after war crime against the captive children of Palestine?

Perhaps we should make a viral video that will make Bush, Obama, AIPAC, the U.S. Congress and Netanyahu famous for their war crimes against children as well.
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Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare dollar. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

****
Need an actor to play an older woman in your movie? Then I'm your man! I can portray all kinds of older women -- from judges, business execs and other insane zombies to bag ladies, cancer patients, kindly grandmothers and dying patients in rest homes. I've played them all. So send me a script and let's do this. Hollywood, here we come!

****Are you a plaintiffs' attorney who is tired of writing those pesky personal injury settlement briefs all the time? No problem! I can write them for you. Years of experience. And pay me only if you win the case.

****
Fortune Telling: If you scan a photocopy of the lifeline on the palm of your dominant hand, e-mail it to me at jpstillwater(at)yahoo.com with "Madame Jane" in the subject line, and then slip five dollars into my PayPal account, I can (and will) get Madame Jane to tell you approximately how long you are gonna live -- and also have her throw in some stuff about quality-of-life as well.

****

I recently got my Notary Public commission!

Need a Notary Public? Have seal, will travel. E-mail me at jpstillwater@yahoo.com and I'll stamp your document, make it official and only charge $10. Of course if you live outside of Berkeley, I may have to charge travel expenses -- but am well worth it!

****

Want something good to read? Buy my book! "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips for Touring Today's Middle East," available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. http://www.amazon.com/Bring-Your-Own-Flak-Jacket/dp/0978615719/ref=cm_pdp_rev_itm_title_1. It's like if Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain and/or Janet Evanovich went to war.

I also wrote a book about going on Hajj (also included as a chapter in "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket," but this book is cheaper -- but it's worth buying them both!) My book on the Hajj is so outstanding that I bet even Christian fundamentalists will love it! Please buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/Mecca-Hajj-Lessons-Islamic-School/dp/0978615700/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1238806637&sr=1-2
****
"Imagine a world where EVERY child is wanted, nurtured, protected and loved: World peace in one generation!" You can now buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for parents and teachers. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters


"Life is a competition. The winners are the ones who do the most good deeds." You can also buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for those of us who are still idealists in these troubled times. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters

Beware, Californians: The Repub electoral circus is coming to town

Now that my state is about to be invaded by the Republican circus, the only advice I can offer California voters right now is, "Shelter in place!" But as the GOP electoral freak show prepares to hit the Golden State really hard between now and our June 5 primary election, there is clearly going to be no place to hide.

Not only are we here in California going to have to endure the same electoral horrors that Ohio, New Hampshire, Indiana, etc. have already been forced to suffer through, but, because of California's crucial role in choosing a final Repub candidate in Tampa, there's going to be even more of that sideshow kind of creepiness here.

Imagine sitting down to relax and spend a peaceful evening watching "Survivor" or "Dancing With the Stars" after a long hard day at work -- and having to suffer through thousands of commercials featuring Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney instead.

Nightmare on Sunset Boulevard!

Two important political factors are converging here right now, both of them portending extremely bad news for us Californians. First, it seems that California's electoral votes are going to be crucial to the outcome of the 2012 Republican presidential convention in Tampa -- and whoever wins California could very well take the entire GOP nomination.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, "The failure of any candidate to take command of the campaign makes it increasingly likely that the state's June 5 primary and its 172 delegates will be fiercely contested." http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/03/07/MNLG1NHGJM.DTL

Second, after the Supreme Court passed that traitorous and cheezy Citizens United decision that allows corporatist SuperPacs to spend billions on campaign ads, we are gonna be literally swamped, drowned, assaulted and bombarded with thousands of in-your-face commercials of Romney and Rick saying really stupid things. And this blatant dark carnival will continue to pour mercilessly into our living rooms night and day for months. Ugh!

Duck and cover, California. We are in for it now.

"Gag me with a spoon," as one Valley Girl was recently heard to say. You've got that right.

PS: I've finally given up on trying to persuade hard-core right-wing Fox News fans that they are working against their own best interests when they vote for Republican candidates -- and even many of the Democrats' candidates too. Let them all slit their own throats. Fine with me. Just don't be getting your blood all over MY carpet.

Americans these days are actually willingly voting for every single One Percent/Wall Street/AIPAC candidate that they can get their hands on. That's insane. The Middle East horror-show War for Oil and the nightmare War for Drugs and the sadistic War on Jobs, Infrastructure and Education are all being happily supported by actual American voters. That's just crazy. You might as well vote yourself into the cemetery and be done with it.

What to do? Here's a good idea. Let's divide America into two basic groups: The rational/sane group -- and Fox News viewers. Then let's move all FNVs into the deep South, Texas and Indiana so that they can form their own nation -- and leave the rest of us in peace.

"But, Jane, you can't do that!" the FNVs might say. And why not? Could it be because the rest of us are now paying through our teeth for all those pork-barrels, entitlements and earmarks that are currently keeping Republican states afloat?

Let the new FNV nation see how far it can get if it alone is responsible for paying for all those earmarks that FNVers now receive from the rest of us, as well as now having to actually pay for all those banksters bailouts and useless, brutal and unnecessary Middle East wars that Repubs seem to love so much. You love them? Then YOU pay for them.

And we can even move Wall Street to Dallas!

PPS: The Republicans are once again offering to solve the national economic crisis by not taxing the rich and by continuing to subsidize oil companies despite their record-breaking new profits. However, California could easily solve its budgetary crisis in less than a New York minute by following Alaska's example and placing an oil tax on all that black gold that is currently pouring out of our wells untaxed. End of problem. Never gonna happen. Thanks for nothing, Republicans.

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Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare dollar. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

****
Need an actor to play an older woman in your movie? Then I'm your man! I can portray all kinds of older women -- from judges, business execs and other insane zombies to bag ladies, cancer patients, kindly grandmothers and dying patients in rest homes. I've played them all. So send me a script and let's do this. Hollywood, here we come!

****
Are you a plaintiffs' attorney who is tired of writing those pesky personal injury settlement briefs all the time? No problem! I can write them for you. Years of experience. And pay me only if you win the case.

****
Fortune Telling: If you scan a photocopy of the lifeline on the palm of your dominant hand, e-mail it to me at jpstillwater(at)yahoo.com with "Madame Jane" in the subject line, and then slip five dollars into my PayPal account, I can (and will) get Madame Jane to tell you approximately how long you are gonna live -- and also have her throw in some stuff about quality-of-life as well.

****

I recently got my Notary Public commission!

Need a Notary Public? Have seal, will travel. E-mail me at jpstillwater@yahoo.com and I'll stamp your document, make it official and only charge $10. Of course if you live outside of Berkeley, I may have to charge travel expenses -- but am well worth it!

****

Want something good to read? Buy my book! "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips for Touring Today's Middle East," available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. http://www.amazon.com/Bring-Your-Own-Flak-Jacket/dp/0978615719/ref=cm_pdp_rev_itm_title_1. It's like if Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain and/or Janet Evanovich went to war.

I also wrote a book about going on Hajj (also included as a chapter in "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket," but this book is cheaper -- but it's worth buying them both!) My book on the Hajj is so outstanding that I bet even Christian fundamentalists will love it! Please buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/Mecca-Hajj-Lessons-Islamic-School/dp/0978615700/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1238806637&sr=1-2

****

"Imagine a world where EVERY child is wanted, nurtured, protected and loved: World peace in one generation!" You can now buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for parents and teachers. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters



"Life is a competition. The winners are the ones who do the most good deeds." You can also buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for those of us who are still idealists in these troubled times. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters

The Butchers' Ball: Dancing with NATO, Gaddafi, Assad & Jesus

Poor Muammar Gaddafi. That man was an idiot and deserved what he got. Why? Because Gaddafi had put all his eggs in one basket -- and actually believed that the use of extreme violence would always win in the end. The man had learned NOTHING from history.

Historically, the use of violence has only and always led to the constantly-escalating use of even more violence, more killing and more money being spent on guns instead of butter -- resulting in a severely down-graded "homeland," with more decayed infrastructure, more uneducated school children, more rotting teeth, more unhappy citizens, less security and, eventually, the decline of civilization as we know it.

Whenever your average citizen sees his or her nation's leaders regularly spending over a million dollars just on the purchase of only one tank -- while the citizens themselves get no benefits from said violence except for crumbling schools, no jobs and no dental plans? Then these people eventually do tend to get rather pissed off. Plus isn't it committing a big sin to kill?

As one Sudanese general -- who killed thousands in southern Sudan so he could willingly hand over his country's oil properties to Pappy Bush -- once said http://nymag.com/arts/books/reviews/23147/, "The best way to catch a fish is to drain the pond." Fine. So then you drain it and you catch a few fish. But now that pond is totally gone forever and no more fish will ever grow there again. Ever.

And now even individual American cities are buying tanks instead of keeping their infrastructures safe and their schools open. Is this really the best use of our funds? In the long run, violence is never the best solution to problems. Jesus was right after all.

Gaddafi obviously didn't properly consider the possibility that violence will always lead to more violence -- until nothing is left. And now Syria's Bashar al-Assad is also neglecting that simple equation as well. Apparently Assad learned nothing from Gaddafi's tragic end. And apparently America, Britain, Israel, Saudi Arabia and NATO haven't learned anything from it either. The escalation of violence always eventually brings down the man behind the gun. Always. It may take years, decades or perhaps even centuries. But that's what always eventually happens.

That's why we have presidents in Washington now and not Caesars.

Scottish journalist David Pratt just wrote a very interesting first-hand report about the rebellion against Assad in Syria, http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/rebels-on-the-retreat.16922939, and guess what? Those rebels are totally pissed off at Assad. According to Pratt, one rebel told him that, "I will keep fighting until we win or I am dead. If Assad steps down and offers free and fair elections, then I would happily put down my gun."

So Assad is now falling exactly into the same trap that Gaddafi fell into -- by butchering dissenters and fueling the flames of violence. Get a clue, Assad! Hold the freaking elections!

PS: America and NATO have no more business escalating violence in Syria than Assad has. They seem to be acting like idiots too. And it's also idiotic for the corporate Goliahs who currently control Washington to escalate violence against their own dissenting American citizens as well. However, that's a whole other story -- but one that will eventually end badly too. Just ask Gaddafi. Or Jesus. Or the last Roman emperor.

PPS: According to British journalist Ziauddin Sardar http://www.amazon.com/Desperately-Seeking-Paradise-Journeys-Sceptical/dp/186207755X, Bashar al-Assad, like Saddam Hussein before him, thinks like a Ba'athist -- and Ba'athists basically believe in the establishment of an elite upper class that practices socialism for the rich and welfare for the wealthy. Sound familiar? Sound a lot like the corporate dudes who are now running Washington DC? American Ba'athists. Saddam would be so proud of us.

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Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare dollar. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

****
Need an actor to play an older woman in your movie? Then I'm your man! I can portray all kinds of older women -- from judges, business execs and other insane zombies to bag ladies, cancer patients, kindly grandmothers and dying patients in rest homes. I've played them all. So send me a script and let's do this. Hollywood, here we come!

****
Are you a plaintiffs' attorney who is tired of writing those pesky personal injury settlement briefs all the time? No problem! I can write them for you. Years of experience. And pay me only if you win the case.

****
Fortune Telling: If you scan a photocopy of the lifeline on the palm of your dominant hand, e-mail it to me at jpstillwater(at)yahoo.com with "Madame Jane" in the subject line, and then slip five dollars into my PayPal account, I can (and will) get Madame Jane to tell you approximately how long you are gonna live -- and also have her throw in some stuff about quality-of-life as well.

****

I recently got my Notary Public commission!

Need a Notary Public? Have seal, will travel. E-mail me at jpstillwater@yahoo.com and I'll stamp your document, make it official and only charge $10. Of course if you live outside of Berkeley, I may have to charge travel expenses -- but am well worth it!

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Want something good to read? Buy my book! "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips for Touring Today's Middle East," available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. http://www.amazon.com/Bring-Your-Own-Flak-Jacket/dp/0978615719/ref=cm_pdp_rev_itm_title_1. It's like if Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain and/or Janet Evanovich went to war.

I also wrote a book about going on Hajj (also included as a chapter in "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket," but this book is cheaper -- but it's worth buying them both!) My book on the Hajj is so outstanding that I bet even Christian fundamentalists will love it! Please buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/Mecca-Hajj-Lessons-Islamic-School/dp/0978615700/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1238806637&sr=1-2

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"Imagine a world where EVERY child is wanted, nurtured, protected and loved: World peace in one generation!" You can now buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for parents and teachers. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters



"Life is a competition. The winners are the ones who do the most good deeds." You can also buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for those of us who are still idealists in these troubled times. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters