Cacaphony of Ego

The Church of England has voted against the ordination of women bishops.  As expected, the denouement of a nine year debate has been met with expressions of shock, grief and doom.  Really.

There is, first off, something ludicrous about a form of decision which is so blatantly political and which reduces doctrine to legislation being voted on by upper and lower parliamentary houses.  I do not mean to say that the laios should have no say in shaping of church doctrine and custom.  But there is a difference between laios and demos.  What is needed is a more meditative framework which restrains desire and induces greater reflection on the source and course of tradition.

Would we put science "to a vote?"  Whether we accept or reject the analogy says a lot about what we think religion is in the first place. 

But in all events the whole fracas is nothing more than a cacophony of ego.  All the talk about equality of opportunity and granting women the means to achieve or express their "full potential" is just a lot of genteel tiptoeing around naked ambition. People don't seek to be bishop because they are humble.

Of course, one would have to be a donkey not to realize that the Church has been the chariot of male ambition for millenia.   But equalizing a bad habit is hardly good news.

All the strife and anguish boils down to whether a very small handful of otherwise quite comfortable women get to ride to the top.  On the scale of global priorities such preferential options are rather low on my scale.

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Another Slaughter in Canada

Canada proposes to kill 70,000 grey seals "in order" to revive depleted stocks of cod.  In other words, sweet, pacific, multi-culutral kanada proposes to slaughter one creature so that it can hunt and plunder another. 

Why is the human race so fucked up?

Fortunately a group of marine scientists have publicly called into question the dipshit thinking of the Kanadian Senate's Standing Committee on Fish which concluded with brazen stupidity that since seals eat "fish" they are the cause of diminished stocks of "cod".

This is about as stupid and fucked up as saying that since a pig is an animal and a cow is an animal therefore a pig is a cow.

Do seals eat cod?  Answer: noooooooooooo.

If you happen to read this, write the Canadian government and tell them they have shit for brains.


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A Shifting Tone

The Eurozone has "slipped" back into recession, following two quarters of negative contraction.

According to Saxo Bank's chief economist, Steen Jakobsen, the dip "was totally expected because of austerity policies combined with world growth slowing down."  Jakobsen added, "The last couple of days have created a new momentum for a major change in policy input, because up until this week, social tension was not part of equation. It seems like the tone has shifted dramatically."

Translation: We bankers knew that our cut of flesh would wound Europe's economic health and we really didn't give a shit if people howled in pain.

Paul de Grauwe, a professor at the London School of Economics agreed, saying that the return to recession was the predictable result "of excessive austerity" imposed by Germany. "The degree of austerity has now put so many people in terrible conditions that they reject all of this. That's a very dangerous situation."

Translation: people are thinking of revolution.

Good.

The system needs a trashing. "Austerity" is just a cute word for balancing banker books on empty stomachs.  All the double talk is simply this:  banks lent money to Southern Europe and they want it back, with interest and fuck the "social tension" that might ensue.  Human needs of food, shelter, and purpose are "not part of the equation."   A person who thinks that way should be shot and a system which is built on such a premise needs to be destroyed.

If people "reject all of this" - that might be "dangerous" to banksters, but it is not dangerous to the people who have awoken to the cause of their miseries.

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Why Romney Lost

The aftermath of the election has seen a good deal of posgnosticating as to why Romney was defeated.  At bottom, the answer is simple:  Romney lost because he was born with a silver shoe in his mouth.

Creating a Banana Continent

 

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced the other day that the United States would bring to bear a more sophisticated spectrum of mili-cop responses to illegal trafficking in elephant tusks and other endangered species.  Such trafficking, she said, was not being done by the lone poachers of yore but was being conducted by sophisticated criminal organizations,  which necessitated an  equally organized and sophisticated response.  The announcement was met with happy applause from the Green part of the political spectrum.

A more cynical ploy could hardly be imagined.  Since when has Hillary be concerned about the environment?  Not once in her lengthy and quite talkative career has she sounded off on the environment, much less given the ecological equivalent of "I Have a Dream..."

If Hillary has suddenly seen the light, how come the light doesn't shine on Japanese whaling, on Asian tiger poaching, on Mexican turtle slaughter  on the decimation of bees or on any other bloody, murderous aspect of Man's poaching on his fellow creatures?  How come the "response" is carefully tailored to fit what is primarily an African activity?

Let's be clear.  Since Carter, the United States has cast its imperial eye on Africa.  As implemented by Zbigniew Brzezinski, America's Africa policy was primarily geo-political, aimed at thwarting the Soviet Union and its proxies.  However, under Bill Clinton, America's "concern" for African health and human rights was a cover for economic penetration and exploitation.  This policy is in full swing now.  The United States wants to "open" up Africa to Western "development" -- i.e.  it wants to plunder the shit out of its resources with the use of  a cheap and plentiful pool of labour.

Tired of Central America, the United States has now focused on creating a Banana Continent.

Of course, to do this, it is necessary to remove all those so-called terrorists organizations that just might want to control resources for their own national ends.  In other words the Neo Con strategy of bringing full spectrum mili-cop devastation and control is being brought to bear on Africa.

The pogey bait being tossed to the environmental left is tantalizing.  It is certainly technologically true that Chinook helicopters and infra-red cameras can be used effectively to detect and blow away caravans of poachers sneaking under jungle cover with the cargo of their slaughter.  It was certainly juridically true that once pro-Western institutions were established in Afghanistan in place of the Taliban, women would be freed from the veil and allowed the full spectrum of Western Opportunities for social equality and economic advancement.

But somehow what is "certainly" true in theory never materializes in fact.  Has America's very technological, very militarized "War on Drugs" stopped the cultivation, harvesting, packaging, running and street sale of narotics?  No. No. And No again.  It is a total failure on all fronts. 

America's solutions are in fact poisons.  They have a deceptive allure that operates only on a simplistic, mechanical level without any appreciation of the nuances and subtleties of actual and more fundamental causes.

The devastating failure of America's "Wars On..." is so obvious one has to ask if American leaders really fall for their own rhetoric?  To a certain extent the leadership within any system is intellectually nurtured and limited by the system's modus intellecti.   But while some colonel or general might truly think that peace can be obtained at the tip of a rifle barrel, Ivy Boys in think tanks and policy boiler rooms can't all be that stupid. They are bright and they are cynical. Our fellow creatures will not benefit from this policy any more than our fellow humans benefitted from "Enduring Freedom".  Pray for the elephants.

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Legitimacies (Or Not)

At the request of the Ecuadorian government,  Argentina has frozen about 16 billion dollars of assets owned by Chevron Oil Company,  which  Chevron was ordered to pay as a result of the environmental damage it wreaked in the Amazon rain forest.    A talking asshole for the oil company said that if Ecuador had a "legitimate" claim it would have sought enforcement of its judgement in a Murkan ccourt.

As usual, the corporate fart stank.  If National Capitalist America had a legitimate government which was not constitutionally engineered to suck corporate butt its courts might be relied upon to work for equity and justice.   

A Slower Death

     

The entire noisy fracas of has been called an election boils down to this:  the middle class has chosen a slower form death.   The same might be said of the environment.

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