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"News Fit to Transmit in the Post Cassini Flyby Era"
Martial Law * 9/11 Forum * Trade * Wanta Truth?
07 July 2007
"It is the absolute responsibility of everybody in uniform
to disobey an order that is either illegal or immoral."
-- General Peter Pace,
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
National Press Club, February 17, 20061) O When the Saints Go Marching On- - Call Out The Instigator On a Journey for Humanity
- - The Libby Commutation: Coincidence, or Conspiracy?
- - Is Bush Planning to Nuke Iran?
- - Bush Directive for a 'Catastrophic Emergency' in America
- - Press ignores congressional OK for martial law
- - New film and actions for Cheney Impeachment
2) Brave New World and September 11- - September 2001 Anthrax Attacks from within US Government
- - Whitman's Cover-Up an 'Insult to Truth'
- - US Social Forum Calls for Independent 9/11 Investigation
- - Kevin Ryan responds to Purdue 9/11 Animation of WTC Collapse
- - Two Project Censored judges quit over 9/11 Truth story
- - Brave New World for 9/11 Families
- - New Doc Examining BBC Debunking 9/11 Truth
3) World Trade Disaster & Corrupt Democrats- - America's housing crisis from main street to wall street
- - Nuclear expansion is a pipe dream, says report
- - Geiger Counter Shootout At the OK Corral
- - Northeast 9/11 Networking and Green Mountains
4) What Is the Truth About Leo Wanta?- - Leo Wanta Surfaces Again With More Financial Doubletalk
5) Sunday New York Times December 21, 2012
Editor’s Notes:This issue begins with the reemergence of Cindy Sheehan, but no longer as the darling of the Democrat Party, but as an individual, independent, and a devoted mother protecting values and principles of the USA Constitution, of which her son died in serving, while those in office have betrayed in creating an endless war with devastating consequences. It is clearly time for the people to arise, to impeach the Vice President, and reclaim our democracy and nation. There is also a new unity behind those aware of the deception for going to war and what was used as its principal rallying cry, behind what happened on September 11, 2001.
Item 3 covers a recent Bill Moyers program warning us of another betrayal, which claims to be about ‘free trade.’ Lori Wallach, who runs the
Global Trade Watch Office of Public Citizen, said: “..what they're talking about is reviving Bush's NAFTA expansion agenda to facilitate passage of more Bush job-killing trade agreements by a majority of the Republican minority, and a small minority of the Democratic majority. It's really inconceivable why the Democrats would then bring that up to pass Bush's trade agenda opposed by their entire base, by two-thirds of their members of Congress, by the public according to the last election.” This could happen in the month of July or in the first couple weeks of September. Other articles include a
9/11 truth convergence in the Northeast at a
Solar Festival in Vermont next weekend, and a report detailing the absurdity of using nuclear power in response to the dangers of global warming.
Item 4 covers again the continuing saga of Ambassador Leo Wanta and the alleged $4.5 Trillion debt that could have been stolen by the criminal Bush and Clinton administrations, or it could be disinformation. It is likely either one or the other, but in any case, worthy for posting and considering (IMHO). Item 5 is an excerpt from last Sunday’s New York Times article on the beginning/ending date of a new era according to an advanced ancient Mayan calendar – December 21, 2012. But looking ahead, I think I will nominate Cindy Sheehan for US President at
Unity08.org ”When the power of love overcomes the
love of power the world will know peace..”
-- Jimi Hendrix
1) O When the Saints Go Marching On- - Call Out The Instigator On a Journey for Humanity
- - The Libby Commutation: Coincidence, or Conspiracy?
- - Is Bush Planning to Nuke Iran?
- - Bush Directive for a 'Catastrophic Emergency' in America
- - Press ignores congressional OK for martial law
- - New film and actions for Cheney Impeachment
Call Out The Instigatorby Cindy Sheehan
Published on Tuesday, July 3, 2007 by CommonDreams.org
[EXCERPT]
I’m not backing off. I tried to remove myself from the political realm of the US, what BushCo is turning into an Evil Empire, but the blatant audacity of George commuting Scooter’s sentence (he’s not ruling out a full pardon —and you know he will) has dragged me kicking and screaming back in. I can’t sit back and let this BushCo drag our country further down into the murky quagmire of Fascism and violence, taking the rest of the world with them!
I have sat quietly back these past five weeks as the slaughter in Iraq sorrowfully surges along with George’s bloody escalation—and as the philosophical opposition to the war has soared to almost four out of every five Americans. I have remained silent when Senator Barack Obama said that impeachment is only reserved for “grave, grave” breeches! Well, BushCo has created hundreds of thousands of graves dug by their lies and greed. For cripes’ sake, George admitted to breaking the FISA Act (which is a felony) that also breeched the 4th Amendment to our Constitution that already prohibited illegal search and seizure. How was Bill Clinton’s offense graver than George’s, Dick’s, or Scooter’s? Did we ever think that the criminality and arrogance of the Nixon White House would be eclipsed in our time with nary a “baaaah” from the Sheeple in Congress?
George has said that America doesn’t “do torture” when we have all seen the images of torture from Abu Ghraib (don’t believe your lyin’ eyes) and know that hundreds of people sold to the US Army for an immoral bounty are incarcerated within the inhumane confines of Guantanamo Prison which is right in our own back yard.
I have had to bite my tongue – HARD — as the George and Dick crime cabal, (formerly known has the executive branch) have claimed that their offices are not to be held up to the same standards of accountability and control as any other entity in the human race, governmental or private.
It has been recently reported that Nancy Pelosi said that impeachment is not “worth it.” Her faulty reasoning is that impeachment would take too much time because they don’t have the votes. If they could “whip” their own Democratic caucus into shape to defend and protect our Constitution and the people of Iraq and our soldiers as they whupped, cajoled, threatened and browbeat the caucus into attaching “non-binding” time lines onto the last war funding bill, then impeachment would not only be possible, but likely.
The recent commutation of I. Scooter Libby’s sentence, however, was the straw that broke my camel’s back of exhausted ennui. Patrick Fitzgerald is a thoughtful and thorough prosecutor who did a heroic job of bringing at least one of the Bush Crime Mob to justice. Even though we were all very pleased, we knew that it was not enough and that Mr. Fitzgerald would delve deeper into the feces infested executive branch. The lawlessness of the Bush Administration has reached wild west proportions and the inmates definitely have control of the US(A)sylum.
We are going to walk from Atlanta, GA to Congress beginning July 13th and ending up in DC on July 23rd to send the mis-leaders back home to face the music of justice in their own districts.
It is about time us “peasants” (in the eyes of the Fascist Ruling Elite) march on DC with our “pitchforks” of righteous anger and our “torches” of truth to demand the ouster of BushCo. I have a dream of the detention centers that George has built and filled being instead filled with Orange Clad neo-cons and neo-connettes.
If Congress won’t dig BushCo’s political grave, it is the People’s job to do so. Thomas Jefferson said that we need a Revolution every 20 years, or so, to keep our Republic honest.
For the complete article, see:
www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/07/03/2276/- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
On a Journey for Humanity, see:
www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17977.htm= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - The Libby Commutation: Coincidence, or Conspiracy?Posted by 911Truth.org - July 6 2007
Thom Hartmann appropriately focuses in on a deeply troubling aspect of the Libby commutation. He asks whether Libby, Bush and Cheney conspired to buy Libby's silence on the question of White House involvement in the Plame scandal, in return for commuting and/or pardoning Libby.
For complete editorial note and article, see:
www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20070706104326405= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Is Bush Planning to Nuke Iran?If So, Say Goodbye to Democratic Outcomes
The Reign of the Tyrants is at Hand
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
Published by CounterPunch.org June 18, 2007
"It is the absolute responsibility of everybody in uniform
to disobey an order that is either illegal or immoral."
General Peter Pace,
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
National Press Club, February 17, 2006.
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
"They will be held accountable for the decisions they make.
So they should in fact not obey the illegal and immoral
orders to use weapons of mass destruction."
General Peter Pace,
CNN With Wolf Blitzer, April 6, 2003 The surprise decision by the Bush regime to replace General Peter Pace as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has been explained as a necessary step to avoid contentious confirmation hearings in the US Senate. Gen. Pace's reappointment would have to be confirmed, and as the general has served as vice chairman and chairman of the Joint Chiefs for the past 6 years, the Republicans feared that hearings would give war critics an opportunity to focus, in Defense Secretary Gates words, "on the past, rather than the future."
This is a plausible explanation. Whether one takes it on face value depends on how much trust one still has in a regime that has consistently lied about everything for six years.
General Pace himself says he was forced out when he refused to "take the issue off the table" by voluntarily retiring. Pace himself was sufficiently disturbed by his removal to strain his relations with the powers that be by not going quietly.
The Wall Street Journal editorial page interpreted Pace's removal as indication that "the man running the Pentagon is Democratic Senator Carl Levin of Michigan. For that matter, is George W. Bush still President?"
The Wall Street Journal editorial writers' attempt to portray Pace's departure as evidence of a weak and appeasing administration does not ring true. An administration that escalates the war in Iraq in the face of public opposition and pushes ahead with its plan to attack Iran is not an appeasing administration. Whether it is the war or Attorney General Gonzales or the immigration bill or anything else, President Bush and his Republican stalwarts have told Congress and the American people that they don't care what Congress and the public think. Bush's signing statements make it clear that he doesn't even care about the laws that Congress writes.
A president audacious enough to continue an unpopular and pointless war in the face of public opinion and a lost election is a president who is not too frightened to reappoint a general. Why does Bush run from General Pace when he fervently supports embattled Attorney General Gonzales? What troops does Bush support? He supports his toadies.
There are, of course, other explanations for General Pace's departure. The most disturbing of these explanations can be found in General Pace's two statements at the beginning of this article.
In the first statement General Pace says that every member of the US military has the absolute responsibility to disobey illegal and immoral orders. In the second statement, General Pace says that an order to use weapons of mass destruction is an illegal and immoral order.
Truncated, for the complete article, see:
www.counterpunch.org/roberts06182007.html= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Bush Directive for a 'Catastrophic Emergency' in AmericaBuilding a Justification for Waging War on Iran?
By Prof. Michel Chossudovsky
Global Research, June 24, 2007
"Another [9/11 type terrorist] attack could create both a justification and
an opportunity that is lacking today to retaliate against some known targets"
(Statement by Pentagon official, leaked to the Washington Post, 23 April 2006)
For this article, see:
www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20070625170907200= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Press ignores congressional OK for martial lawAsleep at the Wheel: Press ignores congressional OK for martial law
Posted by 911Truth.org - July 5 2007
The following was just published in the Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting magazine, EXTRA! In addition, another excellent article is posted there right now, entitled "The Media's Mayor: Mythologizing Guiliani and 9/11" by Steve Rendall. — Ed.
On October 17, 2006, when George W. Bush signed the John Warner National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) of 2007—a $538 billion military spending bill—he enacted into law a section called “Use of the Armed Forces in Major Public Emergencies.” In the view of many, this Act substantially changed fundamental laws of the United States, giving Bush—and all future U.S. presidents—new and sweeping powers to use the U.S. military anywhere in the United States, virtually as he sees fit—for disaster relief, crowd control, suppression of public disorder, or any “other condition” that might arise.
News coverage of these significant changes in the law has been virtually nonexistent. At nearly every stage when it might have received coverage, the news media have completely ignored the story: When the NDAA was debated, when it was passed in the House on September 29 and in the Senate on Sept. 30, 2006, when it was signed into law on October 17, and even when Senate Judiciary chair Patrick Leahy (D.-Vt.) introduced his own bill on February 7, 2007 to overturn the Oct. 17 measures, mainstream media have provided no news coverage. Only on April 24, 2007, when the first hearings were held on Leahy’s bill, did a handful of mainstream media reports appear.
What could happen under the new law? As just one example, let’s say hundreds of demonstrators in Boston engaged in civil disobedience, sitting-in on the Boston Common to protest the country’s policies in Iraq, and traffic ground to a halt. Under the new law, the president could order in the Massachusetts National Guard to clear out the protesters even if the Massachusetts governor opposed this.
Read more:
www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20070705155751872= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - New film and actions for Cheney ImpeachmentThe time is overdue to hold Dick Cheney accountable for his crimes against the people of the United States and the world - and the Constitution of the United States.
Now there has been formed a new partnership with many great progressive groups and Brave New Films, the creators of powerful documentaries like Iraq for Sale, OutFoxed, Wal-Mart, and Uncovered - the War on Iraq. United organizations have released a powerful short video showing Cheney's most bald-faced lies about Iraq and Iran.
The time for accountability is now - not after Cheney leaves office. Thanks to your efforts, 14 Democrats already support H.Res. 333, Articles of Impeachment for Dick Cheney. With a little more effort, we'll get enough Democrats on board to start impeachment hearings in the House Judiciary Committee. And when the American people see the evidence in this video with their own eyes, they will join in demanding accountability for Dick Cheney.
[Much of US Favors Bush/Cheney Impeachment: Poll
www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/07/06/2347/]
For more information, see:
ImpeachCheney.org = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Secret UN Report Condemns US for Middle East Failures
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/06/13/1839/= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
US and NATO Troops Killed More Civilans Last 6 Months Than Did the Taliban
2) Brave New World and September 11- - September 2001 Anthrax Attacks from within US Government
- - Whitman's Cover-Up an 'Insult to Truth'
- - US Social Forum Calls for Independent 9/11 Investigation
- - Kevin Ryan responds to Purdue 9/11 Animation of WTC Collapse
- - Two Project Censored judges quit over 9/11 Truth story
- - Brave New World for 9/11 Families
- - New Doc Examining BBC Debunking 9/11 Truth
- - September 2001 Anthrax Attacks from within US GovernmentBush I Bioweapons Advisor Says Anthrax Attacks
Could Have Originated within US Government
By Steve Watson
Posted by 911Truth.org - July 4 2007
Good to see www.afterdowningstreet.org posting stories like this, the
substance of which has been known to 9/11 skeptics for a long time. — Ed.
Is it possible that the anthrax attacks were launched from within our own government? A former Bush 1 advisor thinks it is.
Francis A. Boyle, an international law expert who worked under the first Bush Administration as a bioweapons advisor in the 1980s, has said that he is convinced the October 2001 anthrax attacks that killed five people were perpetrated and covered up by criminal elements of the U.S. government. The motive: to foment a police state by killing off and intimidating opposition to post-9/11 legislation such as the USA PATRIOT Act and the later Military Commissions Act.
"After the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the Bush Administration tried to ram the USA PATRIOT Act through Congress," Boyle said in a radio interview with Austin-based talk-show host Alex Jones. "That would have set up a police state."
Senators Tom Daschle (D-South Dakota) and Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) were holding it up because they realized what this would lead to. The first draft of the PATRIOT Act would have suspended the writ of habeas corpus [which protects citizens from unlawful imprisonment and guarantees due process of law]. Then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, come these anthrax attacks."
Read more:
www.911truth.org/article.php?story=2007070481947290= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Whitman's Cover-Up an 'Insult to Truth'Posted from 911Truth.org - June 26 2007
Even after it has become obvious to anyone who is not a politician, former EPA head Christie Todd Whitman still cannot bring herself to admit publicly that her words after 9/11 were appropriately taken to mean that the air was safe to breathe in and around Ground Zero. Privately, you can be sure that she has admitted her lies to herself and whatever god she may claim. With no apparent irony or respect for the actual people who are sick, Whitman explains her actions in a variety of ways, even by reaching for this unbelievable admission:
"Was it wrong to try to get the city back on its feet as quickly as possible in the safest way possible? Absolutely not... We weren't going to let the terrorists win," she said, which led to catcalls from the crowd.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19419913/Who needs terrorists when one's own leaders glibly make decisions that have the same consequences as the actions of terrorists?
Whitman tips her hand with these incredibly insensitive words. Making sure New York looked "open for business" and "back to normal" after 9/11 took precedence over the safety of citizens. Whitman quite happily allowed workers at Ground Zero to be exposed to an assortment of poisons that have sickened them, and have now begun to kill them. Those are the bottom facts here. Whitman knows it, and all of her Orwellian word-parsing changes none of it. — Ed.
www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2007/06/26/2007-06-26_christies_coverup.htmlAlso posted, with editorial comment:
www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20070626123515492= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - US Social Forum Calls for Independent 9/11 InvestigationFrom 911Truth.org - July 2 2007
US Social Forum Supports Call for Independent, International Investigation into 9/11
During June 27th to July 1st, approximately 9,400 people from across the America, and beyond, gathered in Atlanta for the historic, first-ever United States Social Forum. Thanks to donations from some of our generous supporters, Janice Matthews of 911Truth.org was there, together with about 15 other 911Truth activists from Georgia, California, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Washington DC, and Maryland. We went with the idea we'd work to "convince" people to look at the need for a real investigation into the crimes of 9/11. After all, the various issues and causes represented by this diversity of People were predicated, to such a strong degree, upon the events of 9/11, and it made sense that if presented with the information, we'd win some allies.
We were wrong. What we found, instead, was that nearly everyone we spoke with was already aware of at least some questions about 9/11 and agreed with us! The People, in spite of resistance we've heard from many of their organizational "leaders," are already with us.
Read more:
www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20070702180355632= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Kevin Ryan responds to Purdue 9/11 Animation of WTC CollapseFriday, July 6 2007
Open Letter to Purdue President France Córdova
Kevin R. Ryan
kncryan@msn.com
Co-editor,
Journal of 9/11 Studies[EXCERPT]
Last month, a few Purdue professors, along with some students, presented a short animation ostensibly related to the 9/11 tragedy at the World Trade Center (WTC). Surprisingly the University then announced this animation in a news release, as if it represented a scientifically accurate simulation of the impact of a Boeing 767 into the WTC's north tower.[1] Unfortunately, this short video clip is far from a scientifically-based production, as it actually contradicts several of the government's own, much more intensive studies, and shamefully fails to capture some of the most basic aspects of the related events. To make things worse, Purdue University paradoxically implies that this brief animation provides support for the overworked fire-induced collapse hypothesis. By simultaneously contradicting and voicing support for the official story, Purdue has helped to promote the Bush Administration's fraudulent 9/11 Wars, and instantly earned a notorious place in modern history.
For complete letter, and reference links, see:
www.911truth.org/article.php?story=20070706155755469= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Two Project Censored judges quit over 9/11 Truth storyPosted at 911blogger – June 28, 2007
http://911blogger.com/node/9722Over the line –
Two judges quit Project Censored to protest 9/11 story
By C. D. Stelzer
Chances are, the resignation of two judges from Project Censored won’t be included in the organization’s next list of overlooked news stories.
But rest assured — there’s no conspiracy afoot.
Judges Robert Jensen, a journalism professor, and Norman Solomon, a syndicated columnist, severed their ties with the national media watchdog group over its decision last year to highlight the controversial theories of physics professor Steven Jones, a critic of the 9/11 Commission findings.
More:
www.illinoistimes.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A6621= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Brave New World for 9/11 Families"Answers For 9/11 Families" Week: August 3-12
From August 3rd - 12th, Democrats.com will join a coalition of organizations to help host "Answers For 9/11 Families" week. Hundreds of Americans will come together at house parties across the country to screen the acclaimed film featuring the September 11th families, 9/11 Press For Truth.
This stunning movie exposes the government's and the media's failure to answer the many important questions of the 9/11 Family Steering Committee, a group of twelve victim's relatives who tenaciously fought the White House to force the creation of the 9/11 Commission. Six of them tell their story first-hand in the movie, revealing for the first time that "70% of our questions" were not answered by the Final Report. The movie stitches together rare overlooked news clips, buried stories, and government press conferences to clearly detail a pattern of deception by U.S. officials.
Now, Congressman Dennis Kucinich has announced plans for a new 9/11 investigation beginning in September because "the 9/11 Commission... never resolved some conflicting facts." Please join the effort to encourage Congress to support investigating until all remaining Family Steering Committee questions are answered. Send a
"Press For Truth Pack" to your Congressman
and sign up today to host or attend a
9/11 Press For Truth house party in your community.
"We thought the country was at risk from terrorists and from incompetence," says Jersey widow Lorie Van Auken in the movie, "and maybe worse." Fellow 'Jersey Girl' Patty Casazza puts it more succinctly: "They lied. They all lied." With an election year looming, it is more important than ever that we demand Congressional hearings that will finally provide the answers these families have devoted over five years of their lives toward.
More info-
pressfortruth.bravenewtheaters.com/= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - New Doc Examining BBC Debunking 9/11 TruthFollowing the BBC's pathetic attempt at debunking the 911 truth movement, there is a new documentary directly debunking the program's methods and impartiality - the bedrock of what the BBC was founded on.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1882365905982811133&hl=enIt is a slick, and highly impressive piece of filmmaking - and in my opinion the best piece of counter debunking film yet found on the web.
For comment and link to video:
http://911blogger.com/node/9671For FN’s archives, see:
The Bush Conspiracy and 9/11 Investigative Reports,
looking into the unanswered questions.
3) World Trade Disaster & Corrupt Democrats- - America's housing crisis from main street to wall street
- - Nuclear expansion is a pipe dream, says report
- - Geiger Counter Shootout At the OK Corral
- - Northeast 9/11 Networking and Green Mountains
In Washington, big business and big
money are writing the rules on trade..
Bill Moyers Journal
Broadcast PBS TV
June 29, 2007
[EXCERPT]
In Washington, big business and big money are writing the rules on trade....
LORI WALLACH: I'm an internationalist. I believe there are enormous benefits to trade.
Question is, who writes the rules? Who do they benefit? And who's in control of them?
Lori Wallach runs the Global Trade Watch Office of Public Citizen, the public interest watchdog in Washington. A Harvard-trained lawyer, she's been there through many fights over trade and is known around town as the Guerilla Warrior in battles over globalization and its effects on workers. She's the author of this book: Whose Trade Organization?
BILL MOYERS: What's going on with these trade agreements this week?
LORI WALLACH: We've had a deal this week, new legal text, to expand NAFTA to two, if not four more countries, bizarrely signed off by some Democrats. Expanding these agreements, even with the much-improved labor and environmental standards, is gonna be a net loss for jobs, downward pressure on wages, more unsafe imported food and products. These are not the kind of agreements the American public stood up and voted for. The good news is, they got the administration to agree to add into the agreement's text, binding labor and environmental standards.
LORI WALLACH: The hitch is -- they put those on top of the old NAFTA or CAFTA, Central America Free Trade Agreement, model. So, it's sorta like this. You take a building that you found to be condemned. Foundation's gone. Wall's ca-- cavin' in. You would not wanna go in there. And then you put a new roof on it. And of course, you say, "Well, you have to fix that building before you put the roof on or it's still comin' down on your head." That's the deal that they cut. So, I want the new roof in every trade agreement in the future. Can't walk into that building without gettin' my wages crushed.
BILL MOYERS: Why should people out there across the country pay attention to what's happening in Congress on trade right now? What-- what's at stake?
LORI WALLACH: We've unfortunately seen, because of having all this experience with the NAFTA model, what these agreements have proved to do, not my speculation, lived experience Ö
BILL MOYERS: Such as?
LORI WALLACH: Pressured down U.S. wages; 'cause we're basically setting-up the scenario where we open up for competition, really labor arbitrage, our workers against workers who make on the high end in Mexico, $6 a day but a dollar a day in China. So, our wages, even if your job doesn't leave, the biggest effect, and the economists agree with this, of trade, is pushing down all of our wages. Then there's the job loss. We lost three million manufacturing jobs during NAFTA. That's one--
BILL MOYERS: Since--
LORI WALLACH: --out of every six.
BILL MOYERS: --since 1992?
LORI WALLACH: One out of every six.
BILL MOYERS: But we've gained jobs with imports coming in, and American workers en-- engaged in-- in-- and trade, right?
LORI WALLACH: Well, this has to do with the wages. Trade doesn't affect the total number of jobs in the economy. It affects the kinds of jobs. So, we have sent out good jobs that pay higher wages. And we've increased service sector jobs that don't have benefits and that don't have wages. And so overall, U.S. median wages in real terms, so what you can buy, adjusted from inflation, are now at 1974 levels, despite worker productivity increasing by double. So, how much U.S. worker produces has doubled. Our wages are like they were in the '70s.
BILL MOYERS: So, people are working harder but they're earning less. That is, ordinary workers?
LORI WALLACH: Yes, sir.
BILL MOYERS: Will these new agreements curtail to any effect, the shipping of jobs overseas?
LORI WALLACH: Well, this is the tragedy. Because in the agreements, the stuff that didn't get changed are the core NAFTA/CAFTA provisions, that actually--
BILL MOYERS: CAFTA is the--
LORI WALLACH: Central American Free Trade Agreement.
Basically, NAFTA on steroids with six more countries.
BILL MOYERS: But this-- this agreement-- these agreements were negotiated in the house by Charles Rangel, who's a Democrat, who's the chairman of the-- of the Ways and Means Committee -a very powerful committee. And he was quoted yesterday as saying that-- up to 50 Democrats will vote with the Republican minority to pass it. I mean, that's a quarter of the Democratic caucus, right?
LORI WALLACH: Well, and yes, sir, that's kinda the heartbreak; 'cause if you think about what he's saying translated, what they're talking about is reviving Bush's NAFTA expansion agenda to facilitate passage of more Bush job-killing trade agreements by a majority of the Republican minority, and a small minority of the Democratic majority. It's really inconceivable why the Democrats would then bring that up to pass Bush's trade agenda opposed by their entire base, by two-thirds of their members of Congress, by the public according to the last election. Instead of going to their own trade agenda, they're reviving his. And reviving with a minority support of the Democrats.
BILL MOYERS: Well, help us understand this. Because last fall in the November election, the Democratic base in these communities across the country were on the warpath, right, about trade. The polls I saw coming out of a lot of cons-- districts had next to the war-- trade was most on the mind of voters in-- in Midwestern-- districts and places like that, that had been affected adversely by NAFTA. So, what is-- what's happening?
LORI WALLACH: Well, what's amazing is, it wasn't just Midwestern. That's what we probably expect. It was all over. The Democrats are in the majority to no small measure because of the members of Congress all over the country. Democratic freshmen ran on this issue. Being against the war was necessary. It wasn't sufficient. The economic, really, populism issues of standing up for working Americans by pushing for a new trade agreement and holding accountable the Republican incumbents voted for NAFTA and CAFTA, that's what won those majority-making seats.
BILL MOYERS: So, what's happened? Maybe there are Democrats who believe in-- in these agreements.
LORI WALLACH: Well, politically, it's a catastrophe, 'cause they could lose their majority over this, just the way after NAFTA they blurred the lines in economics. And in 1994, the Democrats lost their seats, a lot of research afterwards showed NAFTA was one of the main factors.
BILL MOYERS: We've seen recently how vulnerable we Americans are to goods brought in from abroad. We had the toothpaste scandal a few weeks ago, tainted toothpaste from China. And just yesterday in the New York Times, big story: "Wider sales seen for toothpaste tainted in China. After federal health officials discovered last month that tainted Chinese toothpaste had entered the United States". Do these new agreements deal with this issue of tainted food and tainted product coming in from China and other places?
LORI WALLACH: In the midst of this crisis, and let me talk about crisis my nephew's having to have their Thomas the Tank engines covered in lead paint from China taken away.
The trade agreements that we're talking about actually will limit the U.S. right to inspect. For instance, on meat. We're required to import meat that literally doesn't meet our standards. If it's considered equivalent by the importing country, i.e. the people trying to sell it to us. We're supposed to accept it, put on the USDA label, bon appetit. It's enough to make a person a vegan. We need basically a whole new set of strong rules. And instead, the trade agreement handcuffed Congress from doing what's needed.
BILL MOYERS: When will these issues be resolved, these present trade agreements that are now being discussed, when will they be resolved?
LORI WALLACH: Well, let me say first, many of us still pray that the Democratic leadership will see the imminent cliff and decide to turn around the bus instead of going over. If they proceed towards trying to pass these Bush trade agreements with a minority of the majority, the votes could happen either in the month of July or in the first couple weeks of September.
BILL MOYERS: We know you oppose NAFTA, oppose CAFTA under the rules that were in play then. We know there's a lotta concern in the country about this. What can ordinary people across the country do about-- about what's happening in-- in-- in Washington right now, on trade, whether they're for or against what's happening?
LORI WALLACH: Well, the first thing to keep in mind is, these agreements did not come down from God. From Mt. Sinai did not come in extra tablet called NAFTA. These are just the choice and policies of particular people. So, number one, get informed about what it is. It's not inevitable. It's not . It's one version. Number two-- and you can do that at our website,
TradeWatch.org For complete transcript, see:
www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/06292007/transcript5.htmlTo watch the show:
www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/06292007/watch.html= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - America's housing crisis from main street to wall streetBill Moyers Journal
Broadcast PBS TV
June 29, 2007
BILL MOYERS: It was very hot here in New York this week. We even had some power outages. But down on Wall Street, worried brokers and bankers were talking about a different kind of meltdown. Its cause is not global warming and high temperatures but the housing market. Look at these headlines. The giant investment firm of Bear Stearns is in trouble. Two of its high-flying hedge funds said to be on the verge of collapse. There were even rumors in the press that Bear Stearns is just the tip of the iceberg, that many investment firms took a gamble on what bankers and brokers call subprime mortgages and now wish they hadn't. Because all across the country we're seeing rates of foreclosure and delinquency shoot up. When times were good, these adjustable rate loans helped people move into the houses they wanted. But as interest rates have climbed, so have mortgage payments jumped so high that many people can't pay them back. At the same time, so many new homes were built that there's a glut: more homes for sale than buyers to buy them.
So the woes on Main Street reach back to Wall Street and vice versa. That's behind the fear of a financial meltdown. Gretchen Morgenson covers the financial world for the New York Times. A former stockbroker, she's now a columnist and assistant business and financial editor at the Times. She won the Pulitzer Prize in 2002 for her trenchant and incisive coverage of Wall Street. Welcome to The Journal.
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: We're just starting to see, I think, the shaky ground that is the result of what you just described, which was excessive amounts of loans made to people who could not afford them and excessive amounts of money thrown into the mortgage arena by investors who were very eager for high-yielding investments. I think it was a mania. It fed the real estate mania, the real estate bubble in many parts of the country.
BILL MOYERS: So somebody lends money to a home buyer who's not a good credit risk, who can't really pay it back. But then that lender, as I understand it, sells the loan to Wall Street. And the lender walks away.
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: Correct. Correct.
BILL MOYERS: And that just escalates with a lot of people doing it?
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: It feeds into this idea that we need to make more loans. The lender in the old days kept the loan on the balance sheet, had an interest in seeing that it was repaid. Now this lender sells it to someone else. Not his problem anymore. Gets the money back to make another loan. The lenders now are more interested in earning the fees associated with the mortgages, which are extremely lucrative. And they have no credit risk because they have pawned off the loan on somebody else; it's somebody else's problem. That helped to feed this mania for mortgage produ-- mortgage securities that then played into this idea of giving a mortgage to anybody who was ambulatory.
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: We had a situation where they would give money to people who could not document their income, who could not provide a down payment. Then you would have second loans on top of those loans. There was so much money around, Bill, that seeking, you know-- looking for a way to be deployed--
BILL MOYERS: The chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, Barney Frank said on television this week that it's a pretty simple matter. Don't lend money beyond what they can expect to pay and don't lend money without verifying what people can pay back. That's pretty good advice, isn't it? Why don't they follow it?
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: Sounds pretty simple, right? Well, why didn't they follow it? Because there was so much money to be made in fees by not following it. Throw money at people who can't pay their loan back. It won't matter. I'm not going to own the loan. I'm not going to have it. It'll be somebody else's problem by the time it comes a cropper.
BILL MOYERS: So what's the effect down on Main Street? When you look out across the country, what does this mean to ordinary folks?
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: I think we're going to have a protracted decline in real estate prices. And whether or not it depends what your circumstance is. Each person's different. Do they have equity in their home? Then they don't have to worry so much. If they don't have equity in their home and they have a mortgage that's going to reset at a higher rate because interest rates have risen, maybe they can't afford the mortgage anymore. Maybe their house is going to go on the market. It's going to be a long, unwinding process. It's not going to be pretty. It's going to have a negative or a pressure effect on real estate. Continued. We've already seen it to some degree. And I just think that people are going to be less willing to take risk. And that will extend into the corporate bond market, the ability for companies to raise money, their interest costs will go up. They'll have to pay investors more because investors are going to say, "Wait a minute. I'm afraid of risk here. I'm going to demand more money for my investment dollar." Companies will have to pay more. It's going to have a major impact.
BILL MOYERS: But where's the Fed in all this? I mean I was in Washington a number of years. The Fed had an office of banking. Its job, its mission was to try to make sure that there was some due diligence and some oversight of this kind of process. What's happened to that?
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: Well, the Fed is interested in the safety and soundness of the financial system, okay? And so in this particular situation, you have loans that are being made, then securitized, made into securities sold on Wall Street. So the bank is not at risk necessarily as much as it was in the old days when a bank might make a bad loan. Now it's the investor who owns the loan. The Fed is not about protecting investors. That's the Securities and Exchange Commission's job. So it's changed the whole way that mortgages are now sold, underwritten by banks and then securities firms has changed the entire makeup of this market, turned it into a mania, and now we're feeling the ill effects of the unwinding.
BILL MOYERS: Was Washington feeding this, fueling this, or welcoming this? I mean, after all, it is a good thing when people can buy homes that they couldn't afford otherwise. So if you're a politician there and people are happy in your district because they're buying a house, you'd feel pretty good about that, right?
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: Absolutely. And it's been a policy of the government to try to encourage home ownership. And under-- with this mania, with the subprime loans that were going on, we did reach a peak in home ownership of 69 percent.
BILL MOYERS: Right. The highest in history.
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: The highest in history. But I would ask you, "What's the good of getting people into a home if they can't afford it and they're then going to have to go into foreclosure?" It goes back to the idea of suitability. Are these loans suitable to the people that you're giving them to? Are these investments suitable to the investors who are buying them? There seem to have been a breakdown in that question.
BILL MOYERS: Does this contribute to what you and I both know are-- is growing inequality in the country? The gap between the rich and the poor? The greatest gap since 1929? Is this contributing to that gap?
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: To the degree that Wall Street made an awful, awful lot of money on these securities, yes, it contributes to that gap. To people who work on Wall Street, you saw the enormous bonuses, the enormous payouts to the CEOs of these firms. Absolutely. The mortgage mania contributed to that..
BILL MOYERS: Are we living in a new gilded age?
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: Absolutely. A new gilded age. Except this time around, instead of when we had Vanderbilts and Goulds and Morgans and pick your name, building physical assets that produced goods that people bought or transported-- Now, this gilded age is all about pushing paper around and making money on money.
BILL MOYERS: Financial engineering.
GRETCHEN MORGENSON: Financial engineering. Exactly.
For complete transcript, see:
www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/06292007/transcript5.htmlTo watch the show:
www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/06292007/watch.html= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Nuclear expansion is a pipe dream, says report · Hope for new era of cheap, clean power is a 'myth'
· Building more stations would increase terror risk
John Vidal, environment editor
Wednesday July 4, 2007
Guardian
A worldwide expansion of nuclear power has little chance of significantly reducing carbon emissions but will add dangerously to the proliferation of nuclear weapons-grade materials and the potential for nuclear terrorism, says a leading research group that has analysed the possible uptake of civil atomic power over the next 65 years.
Truncated, for the complete article, see:
http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,2117711,00.html= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Geiger Counter Shootout At the OK Corralby Bob Nichols, Project Censored Award Winner
San Francisco Bay View
duweapons@gmail.com
(San Francisco) June 14, 2007 - "This has sure been a "Geiger Counter" shootout at the OK Corral and it will continue to be. Citizens armed with radiation monitors in Hawaii are creating a global citizen air monitoring movement" declared world famous radiation expert Leuren Moret. [1]
"I am going to Canada next week to meet with cattle ranchers and First Nation People who are tired of being poisoned... by uranium... by mining... by oil and gas burnoffs... by the "Big Boys" on Wall Street, Buckingham Palace, and the City of London."
"And I now have an air monitoring group working around the world to air monitor their poisoned environments and a black community at Hunters Point Naval Shipyard in south San Francisco tired of having their children die of cancer and suffer from asthma."
For complete article, see:
http://tinyurl.com/2zl3zk= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Northeast 9/11 Networking and Green MountainsSolarFest 2007 - July 14 & 15 - Renewable Energy Festival - On a beautiful July weekend in Vermont, several thousand people come to SolarFest, a weekend community, inspired by art and technology, by the talent and ability of all the diverse individuals who make the festival a place where learning and fun thrive. Here are some of the reasons people come: Two stages of diverse music, bonfire art. Woodland art. The annual rain (and rainbow!). Dancing and singing late into the night. Discovery through world class workshops. Fabulous food. Meeting happy people. Networking. Communicating. Energizing. As usual Flyby News will be contributing publicity for SolarFest, and in return receives networking opportunities. This year FN will share its space with
Valley 9/11 Truth. Nature is an incredible inspiration and teacher for balance and beauty. For more information, visit
SolarFest.org
4) What Is the Truth About Leo Wanta?- - Leo Wanta Surfaces Again With More Financial Doubletalk
FN editor’s note – You have to dig deep to find any other commentary or report on the Leo Wanta affair other than International Currency Review. Most publications will simply omit this story, since it is difficult to comprehend the vast corruption or confirm. Yet Flyby News has taken the plunge in a few issues, to the dismay of some of some of its readers, since I have found some of the information that could be confirmed to make the Christopher Story articles viable in its authenticity and virtue, or, it could be significant as an intricate piece of disinformation. I don’t know if it is the former or the latter, but something is there of substantial worth, even if it is exposed as creative disinformation.
Before the two following articles, here is an excerpt from a 7 July 2007 from Mr. Story:
WANTA FUNDS SWITCHED FOR PRIVATE GAIN – AGAIN
CHENEY DISINFORMATION ‘CHATTER’ MISLEADS THE WHOLE WORLD
Saturday 7 July 2007 01:40
(1) A huge new issue of International Currency Review is ‘on machine’ in our print works and will be distributed worldwide as soon as possible. It will contain a comprehensive account and detailed interpretations of Wantagate developments since 2nd October last year, and will be accompanied by a 48-page supplement on the significance of the documents recently released on Leo Wanta by the Ronald Reagan Library. Further information about this new Wantagate issue will be posted in due course, and on the Books/Subs panel on the www.worldreports.org Home Page.
(2) The arrest of Sir Eddie George and of central bankers in London on 2nd July has lifted the lid on the vipers’ nest of financial corruption that hangs like a nasty smell over elements of the central and commercial banking sector in the United Kingdom.
For this article, see:
http://worldreports.org/news/69_wanta_funds_switchedFor a list of all articles, see:
worldreports.org/news- - What Is the Truth About Leo Wanta?Geoff Metcalf
Monday, Sept. 18, 2006
The stupid neither forgive nor forget;
the naive forgive and forget;
the wise forgive but do not forget.
– Thomas SzaszWho is Ambassador Leo Wanta? If only half of what can be found about him (with little effort) is true, he should be a household name, investigated, interviewed, and "60-Minutes"-ized. Time and Newsweek would have dueling covers and Mike Wallace would be announcing his return. Most people have never heard of him, however, and the mainstream media are conspicuously avoiding him and what could be a huge story.
Wanta is a cacophony of questions.
* Is he the President Ronald Reagan-appointed trustor of TRILLIONS of dollars intended to be distributed to America, who
* Despite his diplomatic 'privilege', was extradited from Switzerland for allegedly owing Wisconsin back taxes?
* Was sentenced to a long term?
* Then, after writing to Hillary Clinton about "Bill Clinton's short-term notes," got a letter from Erskine Bowles followed by a quick government 'get-out-of-jail card'? [http://www.aci.net/kalliste/wanta.htm]
* Was allegedly instrumental in collapsing the Russian economy?
* Is either a brilliant hero or a manipulative con man ... but the mainstream eschew any inquiry? If so, why?
According to multiple sources, Wanta is attempting to repatriate $4.5 trillion back into the U.S. economy. Yes, TRILLION. That is not a typo.
As of my writing this, our national debt was $8,532,356,592,155.72. That's $8 trillion, 532 billion, 356 million, 592 thousand, 155 dollars and 72 cents. The national debt [http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock] has continued to grow an average of $1.70 billion PER DAY since September 2005.
So, where did all these trillions of dollars allegedly come from? No thanks to the either lazy or complicit mainstream media, search engines provide a lot of data worth either reporting or debunking ... but the silence is deafening.
I often note that "It is not a question of WHO is right or wrong but WHAT is right or wrong that counts." In researching the ‘Wanta trillions', several of the most prolific sources are admittedly on the Internet ‘fringe'. Many are gadflies and provocateurs.
However, there are also substantive, credible sources supporting the ‘even a broken clock is right twice a day' axiom. Meanwhile the mainstream media (that spent months on the debunked Joe Wilson/Valerie Plame kerfuffle) haven't done ‘Jack' about Wanta.
The International Currency Review's Christopher Story claims to have gotten the "ambassador of a major foreign power to deliver to every New York newspaper" his reports on the Wanta story. [http://www.worldreports.org/news/25_wanta_default_trigge] Reportedly, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal et al. have the information and have chosen to ignore it. Why?
The International Currency Review reports: "On the assumption that, as originally planned, the 'win-win', above-board, taxable transactions had started up with effect from 1st July 2006, and that the US Treasury would have earned around $200 billion of windfall taxes per banking day from that date forward, we calculate that the Treasury has so far deprived itself of on-the-books windfall taxes amounting to an estimated $10.6 trillion (= 53 banking days @ $200 billion tax receipts per banking day)."
If true, THAT would wipe out our national debt AND put us in the black.
Two major U.S. law firms reportedly helped negotiate the significant settlement that constitutes only a portion of the $27 trillion offshore fund established at the end of the Cold War.
The New York Times or the Wall Street Journal could easily vet Wanta's story and either reduce it to the trash heap of Internet Urban Legends, OR launch an investigation that would make Enron look like a small yellow hole in a Montana snow bank.
Is the White House is getting pressure from foreign banks and heads of state to release the $4.5 trillion?
Truncated, for the complete article, see:
www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2006/9/17/203006.shtml= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
- - Leo Wanta Surfaces Again With More Financial DoubletalkThe former Treasury agent ran for the hills when Vatican involvement was suggested in holding up the $4.5 trillion settlement. He appears to still be running from telling the whole story while not one red cent has been returned to the American.
By Greg Szymanski
April 7, 2007
Leo Wanta and his band of supposed "White Knights" disappeared quickly into the blackness of the night months ago when their veracity was questioned and they were asked to discuss openly any connections to Jesuit duplicity and Vatican financial horseplay.
When public opinion went their way, Wanta and his band of financial fast talkers were more than happy to appear on radio shows and give interviews to alternative publications carrying their story.
But when information surfaced that Wanta, a longtime friend and Treasury agent for one of America's biggest traitor's, former President Ronald Reagan, actually might be a part of Vatican-controlled psyops operation, he went underground, refusing to entertain any questions which might upset the Pope and the Jesuit General's illegal financial applecart.
It is well-known and documented but at the same time well-hidden from the American people that the Jesuit General's financial worldwide financial network has a firm noose around the necks of the American people as the Jesuits were the brains behind the Federal Reserve Banking system and many other illegal banking schemes emanating from the biggest money laundering operation in the World -- The Vatican Bank.
However, for those unaware of the enormous control of the Jesuits and the Vatican over U.S. financial matters and for those who have forgotten about the Wanta story since he went underground months ago after a Vatican connection was raised, Wanta supposedly entered into a $4.5 trillion dollar settlement last May with the Bush administration, signed off by several Supreme Court Justices.
Further, Wanta said the $4.5 trillion settlement was only a small part of more than $27.5 trillion of offshore money illegally being hidden and stolen from the American people by the last three Presidential administrations who backstabbed him and Reagan.
Wanta added that he was a key figure in amassing the offshore fortune intended to be returned to U.S. coffers after he was assigned the task by Reagan to destabilize the Russian Ruble at the end of the Cold War.
For his part in the offshore money operation, he claimed to be jailed by the those working for Daddy Bush and Clinton, who wanted him out of the way permanently since he claimed to have legal control of the offshore trillions.
But when he again surfaced last May talking about returning $4.5 trillion of the stolen money to the American people while exposing the Bush and Clinton offshore trillion dollar booty, there were those who believed him and those who then said he was only working a sophisticated financial psyops operation.
His intentions, according to his critics, was to foment more even more anger against the Vatican's puppet Bush regime while at the same time showing how trillions of American dollars have been stolen, leading to an eventual collapse of the economy.
Truncated, for the complete article, see:
www.arcticbeacon.com/articles/7-Apr-2007.htmlArchives from WorldReports.org on Ambassador Leo Emil Wanta:
www.worldreports.org/news
5) Sunday New York Times December 21, 2012The Final Days
By BENJAMIN ANASTAS
Published July 1, 2007
[EXCERPT]
The year 2012 first entered the public consciousness two decades ago this August with the Harmonic Convergence organized by José Arguelles, the author of a number of esoteric books about the Mayan cosmos and his experiences with telepathically received prophecies. With a penchant for promotion going back to the first Whole Earth Festival in 1970, which he organized, Arguelles promoted the convergence as an earth-changing event requiring 144,000 participants the number echoed Mayan mathematics and the Book of Revelation to free the planet from the dissonant influence of Western science and synchronize with the “wave harmonic of history” set to culminate in 2012. Mayan civilization, to Arguelles, was not entirely Mayan: It was originally a “terrestrial project” managed by a race of “galactic masters” from “star bases.” In the introduction to his book “Maya Cosmogenesis 2012: The True Meaning of the Maya Calendar End Date,”
John Major Jenkins describes his first visit to Tikal, the vast ruin in the Guatemalan rain forest that thrived as an urban center at the pinnacle of Mayan civilization. Jenkins, perhaps the most lucid figure in the subculture of 2012 prophets, writes of the “bone-jarring 16-hour bus ride on muddy and dangerous roads” that carried him to a “sprawling former metropolis” of pyramids, palaces, residences, ball-courts and scores of engraved monumental stones, or stelae, decorated with intricate, otherworldly images and hieroglyphs.
“Sitting on the stone steps of the Central Acropolis,” Jenkins recalls, “I looked around me at the towering sentinels of stone, their upper platforms stretching above the jungle canopy like altars to the stars, and I listened carefully to the wind whisper messages of a far-off time, and of another world.”
Jenkins wasn’t the first 22-year-old traveler with spiritual yearnings to encounter the sublime at a Mayan archaeological site, but he is one of the few who has found a life’s vocation in the process. As harmonically as Jenkins was struck in Guatemala by the larger mysteries of the Maya, however, it was the calendar that really seized him specifically the fact that there were Maya living in the highlands who still followed the same day count as their distant ancestors. (A common misconception is that the Maya “disappeared” when their cities emptied; there are six million Maya currently living in the states of Central America, a number far larger than population estimates of Mayan civilization during the Classic period.)
“Here was an unbroken tradition,” Jenkins told me when I went to visit him at his home in Windsor, Colo., one afternoon in late March. Influenced by the work of the pioneering psychedelic writer Terence McKenna whose Timewave Zero system, based on computer analysis of the I Ching, also shows history to be culminating on Dec. 21, 2012 Jenkins argues that ancient Maya “calendar priests” were able to chart a 26,000-year astronomical cycle called “the precession of the equinoxes” with the naked eye. He fixed the 2012 end date to coincide with a “galactic alignment” of the winter-solstice sun and the axis that modern astonomers draw to bisect the Milky Way, called the galactic equator.
In the alchemical tradition, Jenkins notes, eclipses signify the “transcending of the opposites.” During the period around 2012, Jenkins says, the galaxy will provide the opportunity for the rebirth of creation and a reconciliation of “infinity and finitude, time and eternity.” The Maya knew it, and just like an alarm clock, they set their calendar to coincide with the occasion.
I asked Jenkins how he viewed the passing of one world-age cycle into another in December 2012, and he paused. It was a little bit like asking a seismologist what he thinks about earthquakes.
“2012 is such a profound archetype,” Jenkins went on. “Here we are five and a half years before the date, and already there’s so much interest. Personally, I think it’s about transformation and renewal. It’s certainly nothing as simplistic as the end of the world.”
But what about the connection many people see between the approach of 2012 and environmental crisis? I asked. What about the popular link between the Maya and end-time prophecy? “A lot of people are talking about apocalypse right now,” he said, “but there’s a deeper meditation that can and should happen around the end date.”
It is a splendid, human-size dream, that an ancient people revered for unearthly wisdom could climb aboard a calendar ship and redeem us from our troubled world and the confines of our vexing natures. Dec. 21, 2012, is already here long before the date arrives and perhaps it has always been. End dates are not the stuff of fantasy, after all; each and every one of us has a terminal appointment inscribed in our calendars. And the end might just arrive sooner. Perhaps that is why we need to imagine a supernatural force with one eye on a ticking clock, waiting to make everything new again.
For the original New York Times article, see:
www.nytimes.com/2007/07/01/magazine/01world-t.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
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