Avoid Political Ideologies, Urges Biblical Scholar
‘The 7 Commandments For Happiness and Prosperity’ Tells How
Exclusive Interview With Shari Sharifi Brown, Author
By W. Leon Smith, Publisher
Shari Sharifi Brown
LOS ANGELES – Shari Sharifi Brown, author of the new book The Seven Commandments For Happiness and Prosperity, has identified common denominators in the messages provided by the founders of the three Abrahamic religions – Moses, Jesus, and Mohammad – that she says if followed guarantees prosperity and happiness.
Brown, a Harvard-educated mathematician, nuclear scientist, biblical scholar, and successful business woman, over three decades has plowed through centuries of superstitions and political ideologies to better understand the progression and evolution of religion and how it can either work for the benefit or decline of mankind.
In an exclusive interview with The Iconoclast, she explained that the masses should adhere to the messages expressed in the original texts as a pathway for happiness and prosperity and not be misled by those who misinterpret these texts and use them for political gain, dominance, and control over others.
In her book, Brown details how rulers defined their own religions to gain personal power and along the way misinterpreted the original texts in order to control the masses, how Roman Catholics and the Crusades wrecked lives for dominion, and how Islam is being misinterpreted today for similar reasons. The end result, she says, are battles among the religions that have veered from the straight and narrow.
Brown said that everything we seek lies on the other side of fear, but historically and even today religions manufacture fear to prevail and hold hostage the masses. Throughout mankind’s history, religion has often played a role in persecuting those who are different, she explained. It has been used as an excuse for genocide, slavery, segregation, and war. “It’s impossible to understand how an all-powerful God who created mankind can hate any of his own creations.”
In her book which concisely traces the messages from Moses, who provided 10 commandments; Jesus, who provided two; and Mohammad, who listed seven in the Qur’an, Brown was able to eliminate repetition and redundancy and combine them into seven essential commandments. She said that too often people are quick to consider only one or two sources and not look at the Old Testament, the New Testament, and the Qu’ran through the same lens.
The three are compatible, she said. “Understanding the similarities of the three outweigh the differences. The Qu’ran and Islam regard Jews and Christians as Muslims since the word Islam means submission to the higher power, first the Hebrews through prophet Moses and then to the followers of Jesus.”
“They recognize many of the same biblical prophets, in particular Moses and Jesus,” she added, “as those are Muslim names. Another common Muslim name is Mary. In fact, the Virgin Mary’s name occurs more times in the Qu’ran than in the New Testament. Muslims also believe in the virgin birth of Jesus. However, they believe that over time the original revelations to Moses and Jesus became corrupted.”
“There are, of course, great similarities among these religions,” Brown said. “They all call for high moral standards and serious personal commitment. All share common traditions, since Muhammad learned from Jews as well as Christians, and all have a vision to spread their faith around the world.”
Brown was born a Shiite Muslim in Isfahan, Iran and came to the United States to study, where she earned a B.S. in engineering. She returned to Iran for work as a structural engineer, but after the Iranian Revolution, she returned to the United States and has now lived here for over 30 years.
Although being born a Muslim in pre-revolutionary Persia, she converted to Christianity in school and married into a Jewish-American family. She has lived all three religions and studied them deeply, which led her to understand their innate compatibility. It was through her lifetime of study and practice of these philosophies that she came to the important conclusion: we must follow the key elements of all three major religions to make us whole and secure. This resulted in her going back to square one, the beginnings of God’s word, and then painstakingly capturing in print the history of religion as it moved toward the present and to explain how deviations from the original texts by those who altered them for political purposes have caused wars and conflicts.
Shari Sharifi Brown
She explained that adherence to one religion should not create a bias against the others. “They are different with similarities or similar with differences. We can and should acknowledge both and not make what is different, difficult. True Christians and Muslims are not a threat to each other.” In the book she notes that quite frequently power-hungry politicians take these religions and “change” the meanings to elicit fear, which more recently has led to bias against Muslims in America after original texts had been changed to encourage violence, for political reasons – the opposite of the messages in the original texts created by Mohammad, Moses, and Jesus.
She explained that the basis of her formula to mathematically encourage the seven commandments was determined by using the Gospel of Thomas that reveals the sayings of Christ, and the book written by Rashad Khalifa, an Egyptian biochemist in Arizona, who proved the significance of the number 19. Khalifa was aware that some elements of the Qu’ran focused on the number 19, like Muslims pray 19 times, so he decided to perform an analysis of the Qu’ran, which was accomplished by entering the Qu’ran into a computer to analyze whether there were any mathematical correlations.
What Khalifa discovered was that the Qu’ran was characterized by a unique phenomenon. The frequency of numbers and words, unique spellings, and number of words consistently conformed to a common denominator, the number 19, the complexity of which some biblical scholars have labeled as a miracle, unattainable by a human, providing proof of God’s existence. By consolidating the 19 total commandments from all three major world religions into seven commandments that embrace all three, Brown created her “faith formula.” Here, she explains, the focus shifts from perceived spiritual and religious differences onto what we have in common, and how focusing on these seven commandments along with the habit of positive praying begets happiness.
Numerologically speaking, Brown says that there is no coincidence that the number of Christ’s sayings in the Thomas code totals 114 and the Qur’an has 114 surya (chapters) and 114 is dividable by 19 with no remainder. “When Moses instructed Joshua at the brink of Jordan, he said follow the Commandments and you will be successful and prosperous.”
According to Brown, “It is not the clothes we wear or the cars we drive, or a dry empty rhetoric we belch, nor is it the churches we attend that gives us spirituality, happiness, and prosperity. In the pendulum of existence, spirituality gives us a oneness with God that will lighten the darkest of days. Without spirituality and faithfulness to prayer, we erect an iron curtain around the soul.”
She told The Iconoclast that in todays’ world religion has become so corrupt that “people are afraid to call themselves religious. I wouldn’t want to be called a Muslim because of how Muslims have been portrayed. I was born a Muslim. After reading all these three books cover to cover, I compared them and learned of their vast similarities.” So she decided to apply numerology to all three religions.
“What happened, with all my studies, I wanted to put my thoughts on a piece of paper. People are reluctant when you talk about numerology. People become skeptical. So I wrote this book explaining the history of how all this came to be and how we are where we are. Although I did include the numerology aspect of it, nobody could really relate to it. I added the 10 commandments of Moses and the two commandments of Jesus – that you have to love your God and love your neighbor –and the seven commandments of Mohammad. Mohammad actually said I am not bringing in religion. I am following Moses and Jesus. Islam really doesn’t mean anything than believing in one God. Christ was following Moses, Mohammad was following both of them.”
Brown’s concern is that in today’s world where corruption has captured most religions and re-written the texts to fit politics, people are simply not studying the truths in the ancient texts. “They really, really take advantage of the fact that people are not very astute about these three books. Nobody reads all these three books. So what I came up with was a simple way to explain it all.”
She said that after Moses’ ten commandments, Jesus simplified it in his generation. “There was no Christianity before Christ died. There were no Sunnis before Mohammad died. These were all man-made because of politics. So the simplification that I made was when you go to my seven commandments, it is actually all 19 commandments summarized. So if you abide by these seven commandments, you have done your duty to God.”
Brown told The Iconoclast that through the ages many of the original texts were edited to fit new interpretations, which quite often took away from original intent and were used politically. However, the original commandments have not changed and they are spelled out by Moses, Jesus, and Mohammad. “The only thing that has not changed in any of these books are the commandments,” she said. “One bible is different from another bible. Even preachers improvise and add something. The only thing is, as I said, is the commandments, and I summarized that. That’s what my aim is, for people to become acquainted with this fact.” She noted that she doesn’t want people to go to war over things that are completely untrue. Instead they should communicate directly with God, frequently, through prayer. “You have to be conscious of God and have faith,” she said, “this is the most important thing. If you have faith and know that God will hear you, then you connect.”
“You have to have faith not to be miserable, not to fight, not to go to war and follow things that are totally untrue, such as what we hear today, that all Muslims are violent. That’s not true. God told Mohammad, I want you to go show them the right way, not to have the word reinterpreted to cause violence for political reasons. I went to churches and synagogues and in two minutes they would read something and ask for money,” she said, adding that this is not the purpose of true religion.
The Seven Commandments for Happiness and Prosperity is available in paperback and consists of 216 pages and was published by Veronica Lane Books.
As explained on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/Seven-Commandments-Happiness-Prosperity/dp/1544842260, “The Seven Commandments takes the reader on a journey through the history of religion to discover the key principles for achieving happiness and prosperity. Our journey begins in prehistoric times when men worshipped multiple false idols, and sacrificed animals, humans and even children to please these gods. While the great Commandments of Moses were a revolutionary act of liberation, the Israelites did not always follow them and suffered the consequences. The simplified Commandments of Jesus made them easier to follow, but wickedness in the name of Christianity by the clergy and average Christians supervened. The Arabs were still worshipping multiple gods when they came in contact with Jews and Christians. Muhammad learned of their sole God and brought these Commandments to his people but many Muslims went astray. The Seven Commandments illustrates the fortunes of those who decide to be inspired by grace to follow the Commandments and achieve inner and outer peace … or the misfortunes of those who flout the law and suffer the consequences.”
‘Politics: Another Perspective’–The Black POV
Lecturer Wilmer J. Leon Traces Government’s Impact On African-American Life
By W. Leon Smith
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Wilmer J. Leon III, a political scientist who for 11 years served as a lecturer in the Political Science Department at Howard University in Washington, D.C., has written a new book that examines the “80 shades of black” as they pertain to the African-American point of view. Politics: Another Perspective is a collection of 80 Op Ed’s that reveal, in devastating detail, issues that have influenced the American geopolitical landscape.
The author re-examines the U.S. Constitution as the starting point for slavery and the document’s alterations that have occurred in words but not necessarily in deeds. Dr. Leon provides an incisive analysis of the formative influences of slavery on America’s very identity, noting that “it was free slave trade labors that enabled the economic foundation of the republic to transition from a feudal system to a capitalistic system” and concludes with the author’s insistence that a moral revolution is needed. He predicts that without a fundamental transformation, America will implode under the trifecta of racism, materialism, and militarism, and he provides current-day examples to prove it.
According to Dr. Leon, much of the population looks at tragic current events through a narrow prism, isolated from a broader historical content, which Politics: Another Perspective provides. He says that there are no just solutions to problems unless they are understood within an historical context.
As he connects the dots from the past to the present, Dr. Leon examines the reactionary politics of the millennial and baby boomer generations that have contributed to the “political abyss” faced in America today and delves into the lack of action by office holders, such as former President Obama, whose administration failed to articulate an effective counter narrative and employ effective countermeasures to bring about true equality to many African-American citizens.
In his book, Dr. Leon’s opinion-editorial series follows wars, various administrations, and the efforts of heroes such as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. who made an impact decades ago, but whose efforts never actually reached fruition. Dr. Leon offers a translation of the U.S. Constitution from a Black point of view since much of it deals with slavery and the act of considering African-Americans as not human, but material possessions. This, he implies, is a taint handed down generation to generation which tends to put Blacks at a disadvantage for employment and as an unfortunate target for criminal retribution when none actually exists.
Dr. Leon hosts the nationally broadcast talk radio program “Inside the Issues with Wilmer Leon” on Sirius XM Satellite Radio, channel 126. He is also a nationally syndicated columnist with the Trice Edney News Wire and a regular political commentator on national and international news programs. His constitutional activism has been covered and profiled extensively in the print media, including numerous national and international newspapers and periodicals. Dr. Leon earned a BS degree in Political Science from Hampton Institute, a Masters in Public Administration (MPA) and a PhD in Political Science from Howard University.
INTERVIEW
In an interview with Dr. Leon, Lone Star Iconoclast publisher W. Leon Smith, who about 40 years ago wrote a novel entitled Epitaph, about a young African-American man who started a newspaper in a small all-White community, asked several questions about Dr. Leon’s book and his thoughts on current-day strategies to improve and “make right” the problems of race that continue to haunt America:
ICONOCLAST – Dr. Leon, on page 71 after you explain the The Federalist Papers, you quoted Justice Hugo Black as saying that free speech “is the heart of our government” and that it promotes the discovery of truth. Earlier, in analyzing The American Thinker, you note that its perspectives play into and perpetuate the stereotypes that the African-American experience, culture, and perspectives are monolithic, devoid of substance, myopic, shallow and emotional, basically the assignment of simplistic answers to very complex problems, events, and circumstances. Do you see any way that the field of journalism can bridge this impasse now that the mainstream media is fully corporatized and operates on a sound-bite philosophy?
DR. LEON – Merriam- Webster defines journalism as “writing characterized by a direct presentation of facts or description of events without an attempt at interpretation.” In too many instances our traditional journalistic outlets have gone away from the craft and moved into the more profitable “infotainment” or talk, entertainment, opinion, assertion, advertising and propaganda. I say on my radio program all the time that talk without substantive fact-based analysis is just chatter and there’s way too much chatter in mainstream media today.
Those who practice the craft need to get back to the roots of the craft. Investigative journalism and presenting facts in as unbiased a fashion as possible. The audience has to demand more of the sources that it chooses to access. Too many people have become comfortable and only seek out sources that validate their existing “realities” instead of reading and listening to sources that will challenge their beliefs.
Our middle and high schools have to get to helping students understand the value of critical thinking. Parents have to engage their children in dialogue and get their children to understand the value of “why”.
I think the realities that Americans will find themselves faced with as a result of this new administration will begin to force a discussion about the value of true journalism and critical analysis and danger of sound-bite politics.
ICONOCLAST — Do you think the Three Fifths Compromise should be taught in schools as a matter of bringing the full scope of the African-American experience into focus, or should it be relegated as “old history,” no longer relevant to the millennial generation and therefore cast aside? In the same vein, does the teaching of African-American history in schools provide greater understanding of where we have been and where we are headed as a country, or does it perpetuate the idea that the social standing of African-Americans will always be tainted by the years of slavery suffered by their ancestors? Is there a psychological breaking point?
DR. LEON – My piece “We Must Look Back in Order to Move Forward” #70 on p. 284 speaks to some of your question. Yes, the 3/5th’s Compromise should be taught in schools but the discussion should begin with the Virginia Slave Code from 1669 that read –“ “if any slave resist his master…and by the extremity of the correction should chance to die, that his death shall not be acompted felony, but the master…be acquit from molestation, since it cannot be presumed that prepense malice…should induce any man to destroy his own estate.” Today’s translation, white police officers can shoot unarmed African American citizens with impunity.” This was the beginning of the dehumanization of enslaved African’s being codified in Colonial and later American law. Yes, the realities and history of Africans, enslaved Africans and African Americans should be taught in schools as an integral part of American history since this country would not have become the world economic power that it became without the uncompensated sweat equity of African Americans and their ancestors. Douglas Blackmon’s book Slavery By Another Name is a great example of this.
ICONOCLAST – You mention in your book the writings of Dr. Jeremiah Wright who has made statements that many consider problematic, such as the government providing drugs to African-Americans, building bigger prisons, passing the three strikes law, and treating its citizens as less than human; however, you then provide examples that show his accuracy. As each day passes, do you see this predicament worsening or improving?
DR. LEON – Many consider the statements by Rev. Wright as problematic but there is enough evidence such as the incredible journalism of Gary Webb and the San Jose Mercury News to support his claims. The predicament is worsening. Statistics show the disproportionate level of incarceration between AA’s (men and woman) and Whites has remained steady. When we look at the current administrations proposed budget and how social programs are going to be cut; the problems will only get worse.
ICONOCLAST – Prior to most elections, the candidates say that under their rule things will get better for people who have lost jobs to a tanking economy or who were never able to find jobs. But this promise is never fulfilled and frustration sinks in due in large part to party politics that tend to result in gridlock. We are basically relegated to a two-party system. Do you think it is time to demolish all political parties and have candidates stand on their own two feet?
DR. LEON — I don’t think we need to demolish the political parties. We need to expand the system not blow it up. Sen. Sanders is a great example of what can happen when progressives understand their power. We would have been better off if he had won the Democratic nomination and lost to Trump because we would have been left with a viable movement. Hilary saying, “I’m now with the resistance” means there’s no resistance. Professor Guinier’s analysis of proportional representation should be reexamined.
ICONOCLAST — President George W. Bush trashed the U. S. Constitution and got the country involved in illegal wars. When Obama ran for president, he promised change and hope, which did not happen. He is often referred to as Bush Jr. Then, in the last election, it became a matter of electing the lesser of evils, both corporate-chosen candidates with a lot of money and both with horrible track records. In your studies of political science, which often considers trends and tipping points, can you forecast the future for the African-American population based upon presidential politics or is this an impossibility?
DR. LEON – I will try to answer your question this way. I can’t forecast the future. I will say that with the candidacy of Sen. Obama too many in the AA community got caught up in the politics of pigment and phenotype and ignored the politics of policy. Politics is about the equitable distribution of limited resources and policy output. Too many in the AA community want to give President Obama a pass with excuses such as “you don’t understand what he was up against….” Failing to understand that he was a corporatist and more conservative than liberal as evidenced by his bailing out the banks at the expense of the homeowner and cabinet appointments. I don’t believe that the politics that he ran on were really his politics.
ICONOCLAST — On page 268 of your book you quote Dr. Ronald Walters as saying that conservatives are using the political process to “enact a new regime of social control” over African-Americans and other poor people in this country. I assume that you consider this a step backward, one that validates that “the colored American lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity,” quoting Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Do you think President Trump will reverse this trend or make it worse, and what kind of mission is required to delete social control of the populace when the slate of candidates usually offers no option?
DR. LEON – I don’t think it’s a step backward. I believe it’s where America has always been. President Trump won’t reverse the trend. He’s just clearly articulating it where as others such as Nixon, Bush, Reagan and even Bill Clinton put a “kinder and gentler” spin on it. Conservatives don’t dislike Trump because of what he’s saying. They hate him because of how he’s saying it. African Americans need to understand the concept of sovereignty as articulated by Ezrah Aharon in his book Pawned Sovereignty and start operating from a position of power and self-interest not weakness. We have spent too much time worrying about being like and not nearly enough time focused on being respected; let alone, feared.
ICONOCLAST – You mentioned in your book that the traditional Santa Claus poses a confusing image for people of color. Do you think changes in American film and stage that replace White people with Black people helps or hurts the cause of African-Americans? A couple of examples are the remake of The Bishop’s Wife and the play Hamilton. Or the remake of It’s A Wonderful Life in 1977 called It Happened One Christmas where the lead role is a female instead of a male, a different twist on a traditional story. Do you think the subjects/authors would approve? I know in my novel Epitaph that I would be very upset if someone changed the race or sex of its protagonist, Shipley Fish.
DR. LEON – It’s not so much about imagery as it is about narrative, content and messaging. Replacing White folks with Black folks and keeping the same narrative is not progress. What good is a Black Republican like Armstrong Williams who tries to sell us Strom Thurman as some redeemed individual worthy of our praise? That’s what I call Minstrel Politics – Black face on White folk’s foolishness. It’s A Wonderful Life is a great film with a universal message. One of my favorites.
ICONOCLAST – For many, equality is something that is merely sought, like truth, but is often not entirely found, partially because each individual is different and interpretations vary. Regarding reparations and restitution and the “compounding moral debt” whereby African-Americans find themselves still exiled in their own land, how can these chains be broken? Let me place before you a couple of examples. When I was in high school, my Physical Education teacher was also the head football coach. In class, if you did not play football, the highest grade you could earn was a B. If you happened to be a football player, you automatically got an A, no matter what. In Texas, election ballots are printed in both English and Spanish. But what if you are French, or Japanese? Does this show bias and inequality? Is it the government itself and political institutions that weld these chains?
DR. LEON – Equality for African Americans is not abstract, it is real. Understanding that race is an artificial construct created by European colonists and later European Americans to justify or rationalize the oppression of Africans in America and later African Americans through eugenics and other false “science’ goes a long way towards understanding how to move forward. These are the discussion that need to be had and reparations, apologies and solutions can be developed from these realizations. It’s one thing to not print a ballot in French (since you need to be an American citizen to vote and a fundamental understanding of English is an asset) and another thing to develop a program like Crosscheck or Voter ID laws that are intended to disenfranchise legally registered voters voters of color, the elderly and poor.
ICONOCLAST – In my historical book Revisit The Old Mill – Its Creation Defined Texas, part of the period covered were the Civil War years, a period in which Texans were divided as to pro-Confederacy or anti-Confederacy. Bosque County in Texas was largely populated by Norwegian immigrants, who were firmly anti-slavery, but the pro-slavery forces, mainly replants from the eastern Old South regions where slavery was an integral part of the economy, were in high number. The Norwegians were intimidated to not take a stand, for fear of retribution that could cost them their lives. In Texas, even General Sam Houston, then the governor and one of the founders of the state, declined to sign his allegiance to the Confederacy and was removed from office. Texans were friends with some bands of Indians and co-existed with them well, but other Indian bands were considered deadly marauders with whom Texans fought as they settled here. Many Texans involved in the Confederacy did not like being forced to become foot soldiers, since most of their Indian battles had been on horseback, so they ultimately loathed the ineptitudes of the War Between The States and the economic hardships that followed. A hundred years later, when the merging of school districts occurred in 1965, my father had just bought the local newspaper. In short order, he published on the front page the photo of a Black football star who had provided remarkable feats on the gridiron. In his opinion, news was news and he didn’t care about the possible ramifications. The paper was boycotted, he lost advertisers, and he was nearly run out of town. He just shrugged it off and continued to publicize African-Americans just like everyone else and the photo incident was soon forgotten. These were “breaking the ice” situations. From a political science point of view, is there a “tipping point” or “breaking of the ice” possibility in the future? I realize that Obama let slip a golden opportunity to lift consciousness of equality to a higher level, but is there a movement pending that could make this happen?
DR. LEON – First, kudos to your father; his vision and strength. I don’t see a “tipping point”. What we have seen in this country since its inception is what Dr. King called “white backlash” and Dr. Ronald Walters called the “politics of resentment”. President Obama did let slip a golden opportunity. Again, when AA’s decide it is more important to be respected instead of being liked that “tipping point” will start to tip. Again, we have to look at Ezrah Aharone’s Pawned Sovereignty.
ICONOCLAST — Do you think President Obama violated the U.S. Constitution when he ruled that people must lose their ability to choose and therefore were forced to purchase health insurance from a for-profit business corporation or be fined?
DR. LEON – No. I believe it was well within his authority as POTUS. It was in the best interest of the country. Part of the problem is that due to pressure from the insurance companies he ran from the Public Option. Also, he sold health insurance reform as health care reform. Also, the ACA computer network crashing when it was launched did not help.
ICONOCLAST – In a near-perfect world, how would you design a movement to alleviate inequality? Can it be done politically or is there an outside-the-box approach that would work better?
DR. LEON – First, America has to admit that it was founded upon racism and that its vestiges are as H. Rap Brown said, “as American as cherry pie.” Second, Congressman Conyers H.R. 40 to explore/study the issue of reparations needs to be passed. Reparations needs to be paid. From there we can discuss alleviating inequality. Until then I don’t see how we can move forward. In this instance the political elements that I outlined will move the social elements since American racism was codified and sanctioned by government action and/or inaction.
‘Guardianship’ Can Ruin Your Life!
New Book: Guardianship: How Judges and Lawyers Steal Your Money
By W. Leon Smith, Iconoclast Publisher
Want to give up all your rights and become a “thing” instead of a person? Then guardianship could be in your cards.
A new book authored and compiled by M Larsen exposes an under-the-radar trend that targets Baby Boomers to have their retirement funds, their freedom, and their lives depleted.
Guardianship: How Judges and Lawyers Steal Your Money explores case studies of individuals whose lives were ruined at the hands of greedy lawyers, judges, and guardians who take over the financial assets of the elderly and disabled, drug their subjects to prove incompetence, and totally rule their lives, even when the person under attack is normally healthy and mentally fit. Targeted are the wealthy whose estates are drained for profits to benefit the attackers.
According to the book, “Appointed by courts for various reasons, guardianships strip an otherwise sane, engaged older adult of their freedom while depleting their resources in an ugly loop that seems to mostly benefit lawyers. The book is the definitive road-map of solutions for concerned relatives who try to correct the crimes against a loved one’s estate, health, and even life.”
Larsen explains that the compilation of articles was written by journalists, attorneys, and other advocates across the nation. “Our collective goal is to make this serious crime public since the process needs to be changed.”
In danger are the 76 million Boomers who, at the whim of a court, can have their personal freedoms stripped away, have their assets taken forcibly, and are subject to abuse in many cases.
According to Dr. Sam Sugar of Florida, “Professional guardians are a cottage industry that is becoming more organized and powerful as lawyers and probate judges realize what a gold mine it is to take over the lives and assets of elderly Americans to the detriment of their heirs. Once a court-ordered guardianship is established, the elderly person’s finances are under complete control of the appointed guardian who may or may not be a loving family member.”
“It’s just another indication of how this racket has infiltrated and corrupted our most sacred judicial process and turned it into a cash cow for the stakeholders in this predatory legal system, which threatens every single older adult in America,” he added.
In an interview with The Lone Star Iconoclast, Steve Miller — an investigative journalist who has studied guardianship fraud for over 10 years and is a former Las Vegas city councilman, former Clark County Regional Transportation commissioner, chairman emeritus of Goodwill Industries of Southern Nevada, and president emeritus of Opportunity Village, a charity — was questioned by Iconoclast publisher W. Leon Smith.
Miller said, “What I’m trying to tell people is just stay where you are. Don’t move until we get this straightened out.”
Miller explained that many of the elderly are targeted when “moving to the Gulf Coast in Texas, Arizona, lakes in Arkansas — there’s a million places elderly people are being enticed to go with their money. The vultures are circling in those areas.”
He said the “Sun City communities, the lakeside communities, the ones that are making a big effort to bring in wealthy retirees are the target areas. I don’t think its happening in Alaska, I guess, because most people want to move to warmer climates. I’m just noticing it mainly in warm climates.”
When asked about appropriate vetting of guardians at the Center for Guardian Certification, especially since much of the certification is handled online, Miller said, “It’s a sham. We have been investigating them. We registered people who are not alive. We’ve registered a dog. So, it’s a sham.”
Larsen’s book lists 14 points of checks and balances that need to be put into place as a means of the elderly avoiding becoming subjects of fraud. Miller described these as prescribed laws that need to be activated. Currently they are not.
“It depends on where you are,” he said. “Nevada is rapidly changing its laws. Some of these laws that were designed to help guardians to steal” are being tested. “We think it all started here, so whatever we are doing needs to be spread around the country. As an investigative writer, I’ve been looking at this and writing about it since 1999. We’ve had other complaints all the way back into the 80s and 70s.”
He said that “specifically, one guardian shaper has written all the laws and encouraged all the states and assemblies to pass these laws through the use of their outdoor advertising company. They donate money to respective family court judges, assemblies, and state senators” who are seeking free advertising come election time. “He’s managed to endear himself all over the state and got the horrible laws enacted at our state capitol. Now he gets all the judges down here to do his bidding.”
Miller explained that no one is safe. “A lot of times we found that helpers in the home are sources of bad information that the court uses.” Families need “to stay put. I don’t care if its freezing where you live, you shouldn’t be moving because you got a brochure in the mail” that offers the benefits of warmer climates. “Stay put,” he repeated, “because if you come up to Nevada, Texas, Arizona, or Florida or some other places, you don’t know who these people are. They’re watching you and as soon as your spouse dies, that’s when they come and get you.
“That’s always the trigger. They’ve done it with a few ‘couples’ if they have enough money. The criteria is how much money do you have. If you have enough money, they’ll do whatever they want.”
Miller noted that the speed in which the courts act and guardians are appointed coincides with the amount of money in trusts and financial accounts the elder victim possesses. He said that the predominate bank that keeps popping up during investigations is Wells Fargo, which turns its back “when guardians want to leave the trail.”
When asked how long it normally takes for elder care to be stripped from family members, Miller said, “Within weeks. You’d be surprised how quickly the judges will respond to a motion by your professional guardian to take away the rights that the wealthy elderly or disabled person can have. Oftentimes, the victim and the family are not even aware when it does happen.
“We’re going to change the laws so that they have to be informed and that their family can be there and that a judge must appoint a taxpayer-funded lawyer to represent the elderly or disabled person and their family. They can’t come to court without a lawyer while they sit there with a bank of attorneys working for the guardian.”
Miller said that what is disgusting is that the “guardian is trolling the money from the Wells Fargo trust to be able to pay for the overpriced attorney while the family members have to pay out of their own pockets. It gets to be ridiculously expensive and the elder person usually passes away during the middle of this battle. You don’t hear much about this; it’s not sexy. The elderly are dead and can’t testify, so it’s the perfect crime against the weakest of the weak.”
According to Miller, the cadre of guardian vultures “and their judges covered every base and they did it through the state assembly and the state legislature for 30 years. Nobody paid attention. It gives them absolute power to do what they’re doing.” He noted that now the state supreme court in Nevada is looking at changing the laws, based on investigations that revealed the results of the bad laws.”
Under consideration are the constitutional rights of elderly victims and their family members, because the elderly lose the right to vote and the right to make life choices. It is all decided by a stranger, not even a member of the family.
Miller mentioned a case that is in federal court about an elderly man. “After he got freed by his daughter from the captivity that he was in, he filed a federal lawsuit which right now is in our federal court system rapidly progressing.” Miller mentioned the bank, the guardian, enablers, and others who caused the problem for the man. “We need one case to succeed before we can start to bring in all the others,” he said. “In the meantime, this will be the test case.”
“What’s happening here is horrible,” said Miller, “and it’s just now starting to make news around the country. Prior to this, we were just screaming from the rooftops, but nobody was listening.” He described the acts of illicit guardians as “the most pervasive crime in the history of our country. It’s scary, really scary.”
He said that quite often family members of the elderly are falsely derided in court by guardians who label the family members as unfit to care for their parents. “It doesn’t matter if you’re the most wonderful person. You can go to court here and the judge is going to deem that you are an exploiter in some way and unfit to care for your own parent. He puts a stranger in your place and the stranger is a professional and they immediately have total power of attorney over your parents. There goes your inheritance. There goes the house. Houses are often transferred with the title over to the guardian and the nicer the house, the quicker it happens.”
Miller said that the elderly become wards. “I compare it with the B-movie ‘Invasion of the Body Snatchers.’ The guardians are the body snatchers. They come and take you and become you and put you away. They medicate you. They give you a psychotropic drug. They take you out of your home after your husband or wife dies, and they put you in a rest home. They keep you so drugged you don’t even know what’s going on while all your money’s being taken and your family is screaming, trying to stop it. They can’t and if they do try and stop it, a warrant will be issued for their arrest.”
He described a case where a woman was able to help her father escape to another state, which elicited several lawsuits. After the 90-year-old man was taken off drugs he “was completely lucid. The only thing wrong with him was he was a war hero and has a 95 percent hearing loss. That’s why they did it to him. That’s why they made him a ward in the court when his wife died. When I sat with him, even though I had to yell in his ear, he was such an intelligent man he could do anything we wanted to at 90 years old.” But he had been “made into nothing but a ward, just a thing, waiting for him to die.”
At the conclusion of the interview, Miller wanted to stress one thing. “My only last words to people are until this is straightened out at the national level, stay home. Don’t be enticed by color brochures you get in the mail or on the Internet and move away from the people who love you to some strange far-away warm climate, living on a golf course or a lake and riding around in golf carts or three-wheel bicycles thinking that this is a safe environment. You’re actually moving to the worst ghetto in the United States. It’s unsafe because of these predators waiting for the Las Vegas strip watch.
“They move here and they’re watched. The predators know how much money you’ve got by the fact that you paid cash for the house you got. As soon as your spouse dies, they send one of these guardians to your house to make sure you’re okay. No matter how okay you are, they still say you’re not okay and the judge rules you need a guardian and then that guardian needs to come in temporarily and you don’t even know it’s happened. You’ve got this guardian sitting in your house when you fall asleep. They troll your valuables. They go to your bank vault. They take everything you own and your family is left thinking ‘Who is this stranger?’”
Miller said that often these strangers alter their names to better psychologically sell themselves, like April Harps or Acacia Bristol. “They know your wife has died and you’re at home and you haven’t really had a good meal and you haven’t shaven for maybe a week or so. People think it’s because you are mourning and ‘knock, knock, knock,’ here’s a really pretty middle-aged woman named Acacia or April at your door smiling, saying, ‘I’m here to help you. Have you had anything to eat? Can I take you to lunch?’ And then it begins.”
Once under guardianship, a person has fewer rights than a criminal. Lost is the right to marry, to vote, to apply for government benefits, to have a driver’s license or identification, to travel, to contract, seek or retain employment, to sue and defend lawsuits, to manage property, to make any gift or disposition of property, to determine residence, to consent to medical and mental health treatment, and to make decisions about his or her social environment. All social aspects of their lives are stripped. Any health care surrogate, durable power of attorney, or pre-need guardianship is nullified and the laws protecting those advance directives are trampled.
The book is available through Amazon, Kindle, and www.guardianabusecases.com.
Will Your Vote Be Stolen?
New Greg Palast Film Explores 2016 Voter Theft
By W. Leon Smith, Iconoclast Publisher
Investigative reporter Greg Palast and his staff have been researching the recent charges of “voter fraud” as loudly parlayed by political candidates this season and have found that instead of people voting twice, valid individual voters — usually minorities — are being systematically removed from the voter rolls to control the elections.
This theft, says Palast, will come to fruition on Nov. 8 when a huge number of voters visit the polls and find that their registrations have been voided, thereby prompting their being given “provisional” ballots. According to Palast, provisional ballots usually are not counted. He terms them “placebo” ballots, aimed to make the voter feel good for participating in the election process even though the votes will not be tallied in the election.
Screenings of a newly released documentary entitled “The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: A Tale of Billionaires and Ballot Bandits” are being played at select theatres in advance of the presidential election. DVDs and video-on-demand copies are available to the public, as well. According to theatres which have shown the screenings, at its conclusion the film always receives a standing ovation.
Palast, who is an investigative reporter for Rolling Stone magazine, is known as the investigator who busted former Florida Governor Jeb Bush for stealing the 2000 election for his brother George W. by purging Black voters from Florida’s election rolls.
During the 2016 election, the purge is being enabled by Crosscheck, which Palast says is controlled by Kris Kobach, the Kansas secretary of state who claims his data program has identified 7.2 million people in 29 states who may have voted twice in the same election — a felony crime. This list of names has been kept secret, identified as “confidential.” However, Palast’s undercover contacts were able to obtain a copy and learned that the list is filled with discrepancies and errors.
In the film, Palast and co-worker Leni Badpenny do what is takes to get their hands on the data, analyze it, and actually attempt to visit with some of these 7.2 million Americans tagged as “suspects” and “potential duplicate voters” whose votes are threatened this November. The film features Palast and Badpenny, along with entertainers Ed Asner, Rosario Dawson, Ice-T, Richard Belzer, Shailene Woodley, and Willie Nelson.
Palast urges the American public to see this film, for it explains, step-by-step, what his intensive investigation has unearthed.
His non-profit company has released simultaneously with the film a DVD and book of the same name that intends to bring to harsh light the efforts to wrongfully purge 7.2 million registered voters from eligibility in the November 2016 election. Palast is quoted as saying, “There’s no such thing as a victimless billionaire,” since it is the billionaire elite who are behind this deception.
The voting public is encouraged to visit thebestdemocracymoneycanbuy.com, http://thebestdemocracymoneycanbuy.com/ in order to learn the latest on the investigation. A trailer for the film is located at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kg2gCgFMBOg.
The film will screen in 200 African American churches just prior to the Nov. 8 election, as the film “exposes the theft-in-progress of the 2016 election via a racially-biased vote-purging program called Crosscheck,” says Palast.
In an interview with W. Leon Smith of The Lone Star Iconoclast, who commented, “I saw the film three times; it’s really impressive,” Palast confirmed that Crosscheck was used during the primaries in some locations, but not in California, Texas, and New York, except in six counties experimentally.
“Remember, once you remove, you remove. It obviously will affect the big states of North Carolina, Ohio, Arizona, Georgia, and Hawaii,” Palast said. “This is where the Senate is going to be decided.”
When asked if an individual is removed from the election roll, does the individual have to re-register, Palast said, “Yes. Absolutely, the one way — the magic bullet — to save your vote is to just re-register. They don’t knock you off a second time.
“It is kind of odd,” he continued, “They are accusing you of registering more than once or voting more than once, and then the key to save your vote is to register again. They kicked you off because what they do is technically mark you inactive, so if you’re inactive that means you’re dead. It could also mean they have evidence that you’re no longer a proper voter in that district,” but this is rare.
Palast went on to say that if a person is knocked off the voter roll, he or she is not notified.
The Iconoclast asked if Palast was aware that Cambridge Analytical was recently paid $5 million by presidential candidate Donald Trump as an investment in voter data, of which the company brags they have 5,000 data points on over 220 million Americans. Would this have links to Crosscheck?
He said that the company is “owned by your Texas friends of Donald’s, the Mercers (hedge-fund magnates).”
He said that the Mercers got behind Trump, so he is using their polling company. “Cambridge has enough information on everyone so they could tell you every ‘rigging’ order. The weird thing about Crosscheck is why do they need this system when for a small fee they could actually get Cambridge or i360, or data trust to get Democrats out of big polling opportunities, where you can get a thousand data points and know exactly if you got the right guy? But they don’t want the right guy. If they wanted the right person they wouldn’t ignore the mismatched or the low call data that found ‘Junior’ and ‘Senior’ to stay inclusive. They don’t want the right information. That’s the whole trick. They are not hunting for double orders. They are hunting for a way to knock off as many minority orders as they can handle that they can possibly get rid of. That’s the story.”
He said that people are not being arrested because the knock-offs are bogus. Palast said that Virginia “would chop off 41,000 people,” as an example, and in North Carolina, they “didn’t get anyone as far as we could tell after removing 35,000 and it looks like it was in the thousands of new data that was used. This is how they jam up the voting lines, too, because people in there say, ‘Hey, where’s my registration?’”
Palast was critical of the mainstream media in that reporters are complicit in the illegal voter removals, when they report that “Trump says the elections are rigged and he’s obviously crazy. No one’s every rigged a U.S. election. Well, they do it all the time. In that, Trump is correct, because his buddies are rigging it through Crosscheck.” The other side of the equation being worked are reporters and commentators who are constantly praising the system, “talking about the wonders of Crosscheck to prevent double voters.”
Palast explained that “they run the list of the primaries each year, but it’s up to each state to do a panel their own way. They are not supposed to remove people within 90 days of the election, but they usually do it anyway. One of their excuses is that if you’re a criminal, they’ve got to remove you and there’s no limit on removing people who are committing illegal or fraudulent voting. You are removed before you vote. Since you can’t actually vote at the voting box, they’ll give you a provisional ballot. Here’s the thing. If you’re not a legal voter, you cannot get your provisional ballot counted. It doesn’t matter if you were wrongly accused of being a felon, wrongly accused of moving away or something, if you’re not on the registry they cannot count your provisional ballot, so there’s no point in challenging it because they cannot count it, period. So with Crosscheck, you’re toast. You can get all the provisional ballots you want, I call them placebo ballots, because remember in the cartoon (part of his film), they just throw them in the garbage.”
“The point of the provisional ballot is to stop people from bitching at the polls when they get fucked,” he said. “So they say, ‘Oh, we’ll give you a provisional ballot,’ well for what? Because, no matter what, if you’re off the roll, you can’t vote.”
In the film, Palast and his staff “follow the money” up the trail of companies, foundations, and billionaire individuals who he says want to control the elections for their own profits and power, much of which is done by them purchasing elected officials to do their bidding. This is why in many states Crosscheck has been approved.
At the conclusion of the interview, Palast paid compliments to his staff, some of whom work 20 hours a day, often going undercover to obtain information, because they believe in awakening the public to the truth about unscrupulous individuals and the theft of votes. He hopes that Americans will watch the film that can be downloaded from Amazon, or buy the DVD or his book on the subject.
Iconoclast Readers Mourn Loss Of Aldo Vidali
Aldo Vidali, one of The Iconoclast’s main editorial contributors, passed away April 11, 2016, due to heart failure and complications from a recent hip replacement surgery. He was born on Feb. 12, 1930, in Bruxelles.
According to Vidali’s wife, Viktoria, his passing “was quick and without prolonged pain, the way he hoped his death might be.” She was with him at the physical therapy center where he had been transferred after the operation when the first symptoms occurred. She was by his side in the emergency room later that day when he took his final breath. He told her before dying, “I have had love in my life, the only thing that truly matters.”
An adventurer, Vidali spent much of his life championing human rights, which was evident in his numerous writings for The Iconoclast. The newspaper published his biography in a July 5, 2006 edition that focused on a film he was directing called “Deflating The Elephant.” Below are parts of the feature he penned along with his biography that was published at that time.
Vidali is survived by Viktoria and two sons, Orlando and Lorenzo.
Bio: Aldo Vidali, Published July 5, 2006
Production is under way on Deflating the Elephant, a film based on George Lakoff’s bestseller “Don’t Think Of An Elephant.”
Producing the film is Aldo Vidali, an Italian documentary film director who lives in Northern California and teaches at the Fellini-Antonioni Acting Studio.
Vidali, an outspoken champion of individual rights, embarked on the film to illustrate how conservatives are using frames to negatively sway public opinion and to encourage the public to make a stand against tyranny while the opportunity remains.
The film is styled in the tradition of famed Italian director, the late Federico Fellini, with whom Vidali collaborated on films years ago.
Born in Ixelles, Belgium, Vidali was educated in Rome, Italy.
He and his family joined the Resistance Movement against fascist and Nazi forces during World War II.
When he was only 13 years old, he was captured by the Nazis during the Fosse Ardeatine Nazi dragnet in Rome, but was released shortly thereafter because of his age. At the time, his family members were sheltering several Jewish refugees in their apartment to prevent their deportation to death camps in Germany.
At age 18, Vidali explored the tropical wilderness of the Brazilian interior selling Coleman lamps and stoves to primative villages as a way to earn college tuition.
He came to the United States to study geology at the Colorado School of Mines in 1950 and later prospected in the Mexican states of Sonora and Durango.
After selling his interest in his Mexican mineral discoveries, he returned to Europe to do documentary film work. It was here that he collaborated with director Fellini on a project entitled The Stange Voyage of Mr. Mastorna and learned directing and cinema acting during the Fellini creations of 8-1/2 and Boccaccio 70. He had a brief professional relationship with Luchino Visconti.
Vidali also dealt with government and entertainment industry VIPs such as President Johnson, Jack Valenti, John Mecum, and Peter Sellers.
His documentary works originated a new genre, superimposing fiction on real-life documentary backgrounds.
Straw Hat and the Crown, shown on the Italian R.A.I. Television Network, received recognition even from the Vatican for its subtle moral theme set off by contrasting a fairy tale on a background of real life events.
In 1963, Vidali went to Africa as Second Unit Director of the feature documentary Good-bye Africa, a Rizzoli Production. He covered South Africa, Southwest Africa, Mozambique, Kenya, Zanzibar, Congo, and Angola.
This exposed him to a wide range of human beings, both as a film director as well as the liaison officer between the South African government and the Italian film unit.
Back in the U.S. in 1965, Aldo wrote and directed Sunset at Dawn, a predictive environmental film essay on the worsening ecological crisis, followed by Trail to the Stars, a film view of the NASA space program contrasted with America’s pioneering past. These were followed by a series of minor commercial works.
In 1970, he began construction of a 57 ft. sailing ketch in Malibu, California. Simultaneously, he opened a New Age café supporting the flower children revolution in the Topanga hills. The café operated during the years of Aldo’s boat building.
In 1978, Vidali participated in the environmental-political campaign in Kauai, Hawaii, to save the island’s pristine shorelines at Nukoli’i from yet another tourist development.
In 1980, after years of boat building, the Arcana was launched. Sea trials began around California’s Channel Islands. Outfitting and shakedown cruises went on to prepare for a major bluewater voyage in the Eastern Pacific.
In 1984, Aldo, his wife, Viktoria, and their two-year old son Orlando set sail for the Eastern Pacific. They explored the West Coast of Mexico, Baja California, Sea of Cortez, Marquesas Islands, Tuamotus Archipelago, Society Islands of Tahiti, Moorea, Raiatea, Bora-Bora, the Hawaiian chain, British Columbia, and the Northwest Coast of the Americas. Their voyage covered approximately 40,000 nautical miles.
This adventurous chapter of their lives includes the wild experience of Hurricane Ima, when the Arcana rushed to find refuge in Moorea’s Cook’s Bay in the Society Islands. Later, in a final adventure of their four-year voyage, Aldo, Viktoria, and Orlando survived an attack on the high seas by a North Korean fishing ve ssel by cat and mouse out-maneuver. The Vidalis left Puget Sound immediately after the birth of their second son, Lorenzo.
So, in 1987, the Arcana sailed down the West Coast and landed in San Diego, California. The Vidali family, while happily raising their sons, worked to preserve the remaining natural resources of the Golden State.
A champion of the environment, Vidali later challenged Republican Interior Secretary James Watt, when Watt opened vast sections of Federal lands to exploitation. Vidali developed a plan to preserve the wilderness by rushing to the Denali region of Alaska, forming the Alaska Capital Corporation (ALCOR), and leasing thousands of acres of federal oil lands.
Explained Vidali, “The Watt Administration had assumed that small entrepreneurs could not afford to drill in the Arctic, thus leaving the course clear for major players. ALCOR deliberately proceeded to subdivide the leases into impractical 40-acre parcels, which would oblige major oil companies to buy out each and every one from far too many owners before they could move in and drill. One single holdout lease could stall exploration for years.”
Vidali hired and trained agents to successfully distribute tiny oil lease parcels across the nation. This maneuver caught the oil industry by surprise, and by the time they pressed the government to impose a minimum parcel size of 2,500 acres, it was too late. Big Oil tried to make the law retroactive. Vidali blocked that illegal attempt by notifying all leaseholders to demand their rights against this undemocratic scheme of Big Oil. This tactic was successful, and thus prevented major exploitation of the Denali for 10 years.
Vidali returned to the mainland in late 2000 where his family created a film with students under the UNECO label entitled Life & Liberty in the Balance, protesting the court-appointed Bush administration.
Vidali is currently in pre-production of a full feature documentary: Toward a Global Open Society, a dialogue between great contemporary minds and the American people. This film addresses the urgent need of all citizens to participate directly in dialogue and action to restore their Constitutional Republic.
Reviving the motion picture work developed under Fellini’s guidance, Vidali is now teaching and preparing productions dedicated to promoting the restoration of American Democracy, defense of the Bill of Rights, and openly denouncing the neo-fascist “Patriot” Act and the neocon imperialistic scheme against America.
Vidali currently lives with his wife and two sons on California’s Central Coast. He volunteers as Chairman of UNECO, a nonprofit environmental and humanitarian corporation, and is active in the United Defenders of Liberty Movement.
He speaks English, Italian, Spanish, French, and Portuguese, and is a public lecturer on social, educational, and environmental subjects.
Excerpts From His Feature On “Deflating The Elephant”
Few clearly perceive how dangerous the world situation is becoming.
Inhuman money controls mass media and deliberately broadcasts as many frivolous distractions as possible to keep people from noticing the fascist beast closing in on millions of unsuspecting victims.
Current diabolical schemers make Hitler and Stalin look like dilettantes.
Their skills at diverting attention by frequently sounding terror-lurking-under-every-bush alarms have been honed to perfection. A movie can expose them with scandalous evidence.
As a boy, I experienced arrogant Italian Fascism and the evil of rightwing fanatical religionism.
In December 2000, when America was flagrantly betrayed by five black-robed hypocrites, shivers of horror went down my spine. Our grassroots organization immediately net-published a large front-page headline: “DAY OF INFAMY – Fascist Coup in the United States!” which was printed over a photo of marching Nazi SS troopers.
Friends objected that to use the word “fascist” was an exaggeration.
Now, six years later, most are as outraged as we were then and have been ever since.
In 2004, a second national election was stolen by the same fascist cabal and American democracy de facto ceased to exist, except in the deluded minds of sleeping TV network audiences.
That year, University of California Berkeley Professor George Lakoff ’s book, Don’t Think of an Elephant, appeared and was an instant bestseller.
What it revealed is how linguistic frames influence social conditions.
Reading Don’t Think of an Elephant was a stunning clarification for me of how evil ideas throughout history are framed to allow “the few” to control and oppress “the many.” Indeed, ideas projected through invisible linguistic frames can transform the mind.
Lakoff ’s scientific explanations brought back memories of working with Federico Fellini and learning from him how cinematic images change society.
For example, after Fellini’s Casanova and City of Women, I had watched downcast Italian males leaving theaters, stunned. Exaggerated Italian machismo was crushed by these great films and never fully recovered.
Fellini’s demolition of century- old prejudices and Lakoff ’s linguistic art of framing suggested to me a potential cinematic cure for America.
It was my good fortune to share Federico’s thoughts about dreams and metaphysical questions while he was conceiving his mysterious story, The Voyage of G. Mastorna. This work contains some of his visions and speculations about the human state in this world and after death.
During that unforgettable experience, Fellini explained how cinematic images liberate, dissolve fear, and open our lives to perceiving the subtlest aspects of the world. That “sceneggiatura”— The Voyage of G. Mastorna — is now known as the most famous never filmed-screenplay in the history of cinema.
Fellini’s insight on the magic of light gives us a glimpse of the profundity of his art.
He said:
What is light? If cinema is images, light is its evident essence. In cinema, light is idea, sentiment, color, profundity, atmosphere, style, narrative, poetic expression. Light is the magic power that adds, cancels, softens, suggests, exalts, alludes, underscores, and renders the fantastic credible and acceptable, or, on the contrary, creates
transparencies through which the gray daily reality becomes rich, fairytale like. With a single reflector and a pair of lights an opaque face, with as much expressiveness as a bare knee, appears intelligent, mysterious, fascinating; an open, benevolent, peaceful face becomes sinister, menacing, frightening.
The poorest scene — squalid, shabby — can with light reveal enchanting or ominous aspects…barely moving a 5000-watt light and lighting up an opposite light, all the feelings of anguish vanishes and everything is serene, comfortable, homey. Finally, film is written with light; the style of an authentic filmmaker is expressed with light.
THE MOVIE
Uneco Productions’ Deflating The Elephant owes much to The Strange Voyage of G. Mastorna. Like Mastorna, it is a voyage into past and future … in this world and in an imaginary world where humanity is at last cured and grown to maturity and sanity … a satirical, historic, amusing, and symbolic movie.
Like Moby Dick, Deflating the Elephant is about hunting large beasts that incarnate evil. It will bring down the rogue pachyderms that are devastating our world (just as Twentieth Century fascists and Bolsheviks devastated theirs) by unmasking the secret class war the rich are waging against the American people.
The hunting weapon this film delivers to the people is a Fellinesque-Lakoffian bow with arrows that can pierce soft, bloated underbellies of the fascist beasts and deflate them of their foul, hot air.
George Lakoff exposed the fact that conservatives spent 40 years and billions of dollars to grow, feed, and empower these land-roving Moby Dicks. False conservative frames have just about destroyed our 230 years of progress toward a vision of democratic culture and equality before the law and have nearly extinguished the American dream.
It is especially important and urgent that millions of Americans clearly understand why sharply framed and well-aimed progressive ideas can instantly bring down the ugly beasts.
The speed of change possible through strategic use of visual frames must be understood by all those liberals who wring their hands and worry that the deceitful conservative frames erected over four decades by lavishly funded, right-wing think-tanks may take just as many years to demolish before our Constitution can be restored and “We The People” take our country back. This is not so! If we had to wait 40 years, there’d be no country left to take back and no environment to restore.
HOW THEY STOLE OUR COMMONWEALTH
Exposing how we have been robbed is sobering. Conservatives used many deceiving frames to steal from us. We’ll tackle here just a few of the metaphors they employed to deform one of democracy’s most fundamental pillars: justice.
Mixing Fellini’s cinematic secrets with Lakoff ’s scientific brilliance is like mixing nitro and glycerine — which makes up dynamite. Liars and thieves are in for a big surprise.
The neo-crooks have been fanning the flames of a still unexplained 9/11 tragedy into a fabulously profitable perennial frame: “war-on-terror.”
What should have been an international police hunt by civilized nations has turned into a deadly, trillion-dollar con job.
In reality, there is no war. The phony “war” frame provides a legalistic and pseudo-moral justification for flag waving, criminal wars of aggression, and the dismantling of our Constitution.
The 9/11 Commission colluded with Bush and Cheney so that the inseparable twins were conveniently questioned together – to avoid contradictions — behind closed doors, and not under oath for fear of future indictments for obstructing justice.
The questioners were all tail-wagging administration’s lap dogs.
Lights and cameras will capture the criminal activities of the national security organizations that colonize the world with prisons, torture chambers, and concentration camps. The horrors of so-called rendition (criminal
kidnapping with torture outsourcing) and the deployment of massive domestic electronic spying networks that outrageously violate the Constitutional rights of American citizens and intrude even on their attorney-client privilege will be exposed.
What was once a country of laws is now a country run by a self-declared fundamentalist despot claiming the privilege to violate any law he chooses.
From: “The Most Evil People in the World,” by Doug Soderstrom, Ph.D.
In his book: Gangs of America [download a copy at http://www.gangsofamerica.com], Ted Nace reveals the preposterous way the U.S. was taken over by big business.
Historically, it was the battle between democracy and corporations that started the American Revolution. The Boston Tea Party was an action to block the British East India Company, the most powerful corporation that ever existed, from monopolizing the American commodities markets, starting with tea. The American Revolution was a pragmatic economic rebellion against an overbearing corporation and an oppressive government thoroughly intertwined with it.
The East India Company had planned to replace independent local merchants with a company-owned distribution system, i.e., an early version of what we now call “vertical integration,” like, for example, oil companies owning wells, refineries, and gas stations.
Boston pamphleteers — we had a free press then — laid out the scenario in detail, warning that if the British were to succeed in bringing the tea distribution system under sole control of the East India Company, they would inevitably repeat the same scheme for other imported commodities.
Sound familiar? Think of the WTO.
The East India Company, if once they get Footing in this (once) happy country, will leave no Stone unturned to become your Masters. They are an opulent Body, and Money or Credit is not wanting amongst them. They have a designing, depraved, and despotic Ministry to assist and support them. They themselves are well versed In TYRANNY, PLUNDER, OPPRESSION and BLOODSHED. Whole Provinces labouring under the Distresses of Oppression, Slavery, Famine, and the Sword, are familiar to them. Thus they have enriched themselves, thus they are become the most powerful Trading Company in the Universe.
Excerpt from a broadside signed “A Mechanic,” Philadelphia, December 4, 1773.
Imagine a private company so unaccountable that it conducts its own criminal trials and runs its own jails; so dominant it possesses a 250,000 man army, twice the size of Britain’s, to fight company wars; and so predatory that for more than two centuries it squeezes the economy of the richest country in the world until observers report that some regions have been “bled white.” A third of Parliament owns stock in it, and a tax on its tea constitutes 10% of the government’s revenues. Even the King is dependent on periodic “loans” from the company!
When the cargo ship Dartmouth arrived in Boston Harbor on the night of December 16, 1773, approximately 150
men assembled at the home of the Boston Gazette and Country Journal’s founder. They came from many backgrounds: some were apprentices, some tradesmen, some wealthy owners of businesses. By dawn, the entire shipment of tea had been destroyed. The American Revolution would soon be under way.
One glaring example in a long record of uncontrolled corporate evil was unleashed against this country in 1936:
[C]onsider this unpunished crime, committed by the leadership of General Motors, together with Standard Oil of California, Firestone Tire and Rubber Company, B. F. Phillips Petroleum, and Mac Manufacturing.
In 1936, the five companies formed National City Lines, a holding company that proceeded to buy electric trolley lines and tear up the tracks in cities across the nation.
Each time it destroyed a local trolley system, National City would license the rights to operate a new system to a local franchisee, under the stipulation that the system convert to diesel powered General Motors buses.
By 1949, more than 100 electric transit systems in 45 systems had been torn up and converted. In April of that year, a federal jury convicted GM and the other firms of conspiracy to commit anti-trust violations. But the judge set the fine for each company at $5,000. Seven executives were fined one dollar each. After the conviction,
the companies went back to purchasing transit systems, removing electric trolley lines, and replacing them with buses. Gangs of America, Introductionp. 7.
As Atlanta mayor and former United Nations ambassador Andrew Young once observed, “Nothing is illegal if 100 businessmen decide to do it.”
In 1882-83, Judge Stephen Field’s Ninth Circuit Court, with twisted judicial sophistry, established the personhood of corporations in Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific. This self-evident absurdity has proven to be a menace to democracy and humanity.
Judge Field’s tortuous legalese behind the creation of immortal, frankensteinian corporations coincided with the
view of Professor John Norton Pomeroy, namely: “The truth cannot be evaded that, for the purpose of protecting rights, the property of all business and trading corporations IS the property of the individual corporators.
A state act depriving a business corporation of its property without due process of law, does in fact deprive the individual corporators of their property.
In this sense, and within the scope of these grand safeguards of private rights, there is no real distinction between artificial persons or corporations, and natural persons.”
Ted Nace explains why an understanding of this is critical:
As simple as this false argument sounds, it was a significant departure from established legal doctrine, which had always made a distinction between corporate property and individual property. The most crucial distinction is that owning shares in a company allows a person to own property without being subject to the sort of accountability to the community that normally attends the ownership of property [emphasis
added]. For that reason, courts had never assumed that shareholders in a corporation should expect equal rights; on the contrary, the enjoyment by corporate shareholders of privileges such as limited liability justified applying special restrictions to corporations and their owners. Gangs of America, p. 118.
It is self-evident that giving legal personhood to a corporation, while enjoying all other rights, also creates the right to do wrong and escape responsibility.
In the 2006 California primaries, the residents of Humboldt County said enough is enough and successfully challenged corporate personhood.
THE NEAR FUTURE IN LIGHT OF HISTORY
America won its greatest victory against Italian fascists, German Nazis, and Japanese imperialists while fighting for democracy under the leadership of liberal President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. After WWII, humanity renewed its hope in the flowering of a great civilization founded on the principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: a world in which nuclear holocausts like Hiroshima and Nagasaki would never again happen; where war, death-camps, fascist oppression, and gulags, would forever be mere memories of past insanity;
where international law would settle disputes and people everywhere would become self-governing; where victorious nations would cease selling instruments of death and instead spread the profitable tools of healthcare, economic prosperity, and environmental conservation.
However, the realization of this hope, this beautiful dream, never did come to pass. Bloodshed and destruction quickly resumed and continue to this day: Korea, Vietnam, Palestine, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Iran, East Timor, Africa, Cambodia, Chile, Argentina, Bosnia, and Iraq.
So, who are the Oids!? They are that recurring percentage of psychotics throughout history that makes peace and justice impossible. It is imperative that Oids be exposed if we are to cure humanity and create a progressive world.
By way of explanation, adding “oid” to any word alters its meaning to: “made in the form of ” or “pretending to be.” For example, when “oid” is affixed to the word “sphere,” it becomes the word “spheroid,” which means “made in the form of a sphere” (not a real sphere).
“Oid” is, therefore, a label for “hypocrites” and for all those who pretend to be something they are not.
A Christianoid can then be defined as “a pseudo-Christian” or anyone pretending to be a follower of Jesus while at the same time supporting war, torture, and the death penalty.”
Let’s be creative here.
A patrioid is a flag-waving idiot who forgot that the flag represents the Union established by the U.S. Constitution.
“Monkeys can wave flags, but that does not make them patriots!” noted Scott Ritter (who is a real patriot).
All evildoers can be lumped under a single label: “humanoids” — that is, beasts made in the shape of humans.
EMOTIONAL HONESTY vs. POLITICAL CORRECTNESS
Recently Senator Murtha – who is to be highly commended for is outspokenness against the war — protested criminal military actions in Iraq. While he deserves praise for this, it is evident that Senator Murtha is unfortunately still a victim of political correctness.
After the Haditha massacre committed by U.S. troops, he said: “One woman, as I understand it in talking to the officials in the Marine Corps, was bending over her child, pleading for mercy, and they shot her in cold blood. That’s the thing that’s so disturbing.”
What an astounding hyper-understatement!
As much as Senator Murtha must be admired for his courage, in following the Washington-accepted PC communications style imposed by the conservative culture of hypocrisy, he failed to galvanize public condemnation.
How can murder in cold blood be referred to as simply “disturbing”— is such a satanic crime not outrageous beyond belief? Diabolical? Insane? Nauseating? Evil? Does it not call for Divine vengeance?
To bring it home, just imagine yourself finding your own family slaughtered in cold blood and hearing someone politely saying: “I am troubled” or “I’m disturbed.”
Emotionally honest people express their pain and anger openly and directly.
One trick satanic corpo-media use is to make justified outrage and righteous indignation look like hysteria. Any sincere expression of shock and revulsion in the face of a crime is treated as excess so insistently by criminal media whores, that all truth is neutralized and soon forgotten.
This is how the odious mediaoids subliminally train decent people to restrain sincere dismay, disgust, and rage to grotesque levels of apparent indifference to the suffering of others.
We are told by inhuman monsters never to “lose our cool,” never to let anger roar to the level of rage in our voices, never to dare call killers murderers, especially if they are a part of our own despicable government.
Denmark Suspends Fracking
Use Of Unauthorized, Dangerous Chemicals Occurs
Denmark has suspended exploratory drilling for shale gas after it discovered that the French gas-giant Total, in charge of the project, had used “unauthorized” chemicals.
A defoamer that is considered hazardous to the environment, Null Foam, was used as part of fracking to extract shale gas
The chemical is not illegal, says a Total drilling project leader who indicated he thought it could be used; however, environmental committee chairman Brandt Sorensen of Frederikshavn Council said “We will simply not accept this kind of violation of our EIA (environmental impact assessment).
Hydraulic fracturing is a process of extracting shale gas by injecting a mixture of water, sand, and chemicals under high pressure deep underground in order to release hydrocarbons from between layers of rock.
Drilling on the northern tip of Jutland had just started on Monday when the Danish Energy Agency stopped exploration the next day. The project had been initially approved despite loud protests from locals and environmentalists.
Death Of Eric H. May Mourned
Long-time essayist for The Lone Star Iconoclast Eric Holmes May died Oct. 14, 2014 after a courageous nine-year fight against service‐connected ALS, with Gretchen holding his hand. He gave his life for his country.
Born January 9, 1960, May was a native Houstonian who enjoyed people, classical and classic vinyl music, Texas football, hiking, camping, and cycling. He was a second-degree black belt in Tae KwonDo.
May joined the U.S. Army in 1977. He achieved the rank of Captain and perfected skills in linguistics, public affairs, and military intelligence.
He graduated Cum Laude from the University of Houston in 1985 with a B.A. in classical studies. He spoke Russian, Spanish, Greek, and Latin.
He taught high school for a while, where he astonished students by playing several games of chess, simultaneously. He was awarded Teacher of the Year and received a certificate of appreciation from the City of Houston for stopping a gang from terrorizing students.
His true passion was writing. He wrote editorials for KPRC news. He published numerous op-eds in the Houston Post, Houston Chronicle, The Wall Street Journal, The Lone Star Iconoclast, and Veterans Today.
He was also a poet and showered Gretchen with his poetry.
He loved politics and debate. He founded Ghosttroop.net, a collaboration of civilians and servicemen who argued and wrote about military and national issues.
To mourn him, Eric May is survived by his wife and devoted caregiver, Gretchen; his mother, Carolyn; his children, Caroline and Andrew; son in law, Chris; siblings, April, Melody and Philip; and numerous other loved family and friends.
His beloved father, Harry Holmes May preceded him in death in 2012.
Eric and Gretchen are forever grateful to the many caregivers, doctors, nurses, and respiratory therapists who educated, cared, and supported them throughout his illness, particularly his niece, Victoria White, and the medical staff of 3D at the V.A. Hospital.
In lieu of flowers, it is requested that donations be made an ALS Charity or to the Wounded Warrior Project. It is asked that Eric be remembered on May Day by showing appreciation to a nurse or caregiver in his memory. “Take a walk today, feel the sun on your face, the Texas wind in your hair and know that Eric is in God’s loving hands and he is at peace.”
A 9 a.m. visitation, 10 a.m. rosary, and 10:30 a.m. funeral mass were held on Oct. 21, 2014, at St. Helen’s Catholic Church in Pearland, Texas.
His burial with military honors were held at 1:15 p.m. at the Houston National Cemetery.
Iconoclast Publisher Writes Book
Lone Star Iconoclast and Lone Star Universe editor and publisher W. Leon Smith has written a new book – The Switch Pitcher, a baseball novelette that traces the development and challenges of a young boy who out of necessity learns to pitch both left-handed and right-handed.
The book was written with a juvenile audience in mind, but adult baseball fans should find it interesting, too, says the author.
Published by Black Rose Writing, the paperback tells the story primarily from the boy’s point of view and details how he learned to switch pitch as his team, the Pups, were nearing a showdown with the perennial league favorites. However, his new “ambi-disastrous” talent was destined to meet with controversy because “it just isn’t done.”
According to Smith, his idea in writing this short novel, which he says is more like a very long short story, was to promote to youths the idea of creativity and meeting challenges head- on.
“It’s the type of book that I, as a youth, would love to read. I think adults will like it, too, especially those interested in sports, baseball in particular,” said Smith. “It’s realistic in that some of the techniques are those that I developed many years ago, even the act of throwing horse apples at times when I ran short of baseballs.”
The 66-page book is currently available for order at www.amazon.com/The-Switch-Pitcher-Leon-Smith/dp/1612963110. Price is $13.95 per copy. ISBN: 978-1-61296-311-2, Library of Congress Control Number: 2014932464.
Peru Passes 10-Year Ban On GMOs
The Republic of Peru, a country in western South America, has passed a law banning genetically modified ingredients anywhere within the country for 10 years before coming up for another review. This is considered a major blow to companies that specialize in genetically altered foods, such as Monsanto, Bayer, and Dow, among others.
Peru’s Plenary Session of the Congress approved the decree despite previous governmental pushes for GM legalization.
The Peruvian congress expressed concerns that the introduction of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) will compromise the native species of Peru, such as the giant white corn, purple corn and, the country’s famous species of Peruvian potatoes.
According to Anibal Huerta, President of Peru’s Agrarian Commission, the ban was needed to prevent the ”danger that can arise from the use of biotechnology.”
The ban will curb the planting and importation of GMOs in the country, although research had found that 77 percent of supermarket products tested contained GM contaminants. The study revealed that GM foods are prevalent, especially in America, and people consume these goods without knowing it, due to inadequate labeling of the products. It noted that through pollination and being sneaked into processed foods, information about GM distribution is being blocked.
“There is an increasing consensus among consumers that they want safe, local, organic fresh food and that they want the environment and wildlife to be protected,” wrote Walter Pengue from the University of Buenos Aires in Argentina, in a recent statement concerning GMOs in South America.
“South American countries must proceed with a broader evaluation of their original agricultural policies and practices using the precautionary principle.”
Fukushima Radiation Present In America
New Anti-Establishment ‘Counter Culture’ Being Formed
Fukushima Truth Movement Emerging: ‘Respirator Resistance’
FUKUSHIMA radiation activist William B. Fox dons the new fashion of the future, a P100 radiation mask. — Nathaniel Black Photography
Most Americans are unaware that harmful radiation is making its way throughout the world, putting at risk the health of millions, if not billions of individuals. The effects are currently creeping up on most of earth’s inhabitants although they cannot identify the source. According to scientists, they will become lifetime certainties for future generations as well.
One culprit stems from the recent disaster perpetrated at the Fukushima power plant in Japan, from which radioactive plumes are constantly traveling to neighboring shores and are being disbursed through rainfall on the homeland. Other radiation exposures derive from the use of depleted uranium in military munitions that aerosolize into the atmosphere when they explode, nuclear power plant emissions, and bomb test fallout still hovering in the atmosphere.
Americans are also subjected to many forms of aerial chemical attack, that include such contaminants as sulfur dioxide, lead, mercury, the toxic dispersant Corexit deployed by British Petroleum in the Gulf disaster, and chemtrails that contain the elements aluminum and barium.
Chemtrails are part of the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) with facilities located around the world in places like Alaska, Norway, Japan, and Russia. According to former Lawrence Livermore Lab geoscientist and whistleblower Leuren Moret, whose works are archived at: http://tinyurl.com/64m37tq, HAARP was developed as the “next Manhattan Project” during the Cold War for a wide variety of purposes, some of which are very sinister. HAARP includes not only advanced electromagnetic technologies prophesied by the electrical genius Nikola Tesla for use in underground oil exploration and military over-the-horizon radars, but also for darker applications that include mind control, “weather warfare,” and inducing earthquakes around the world. The latter two applications effectively “weaponize” both the earth’s atmosphere and the earth itself.
ACTIVIST William B. Fox, wearing his N95 respirator, hands out fliers in Butler, Penn. — Nathaniel Black Photography
Moret contends that the study of the real background behind HAARP provides an important perspective to help us understand why major media controlled by “globalists” in Japan, America, the UK, and elsewhere have remained mostly silent about the Fukushima radiation threat, which threatens to become a major extinction level event for mankind and many other species around the planet. Ms. Moret explains how major strategic power bases of advanced industrial nations have fallen into the hands of a criminally insane “gobalist” power elite with very “un-American” values, whose agendas include “global depopulation,” “one world government,” and the creation of a total police state in America. These “globalists” also envision a suicidal “Masada” or “Sampson Option” plan in which nuclear power plants can be used as pre-positioned “dirty nuclear bombs” to take down the world. As one example of Moret’s research, see the interview “Fukushima HAARP Nuclear Attack by CIA, DOE, BP for London Banks” at http://tinyurl.com/d782wud which helps to explain why the American public is being deliberately kept in the dark while it is being slowly destroyed by radiation and other contaminants.
Respiratory problems, birth defects, and cancers are just three of the end results that scientists say will escalate as time moves forward.
According to former U.S. Marine Corps Reserve Major William B. Fox, who has written about his work as a cyber activist along with other former military intelligence professionals in his Mission of Conscience series at http://tinyurl.com/yh2r3zl, “We have to watch the air we breathe, particularly when it rains because this is when most fallout comes down. We also have to beware of fallout that remobilizes into the air when it gets windy. It is also very important that we watch out for contaminated food and water, because the tragic aftermath of the April 1986 Chernobyl melt-down shows that bio-accumulation and bio-magnification within the food chain comprise major threats to public health over the long run. Lastly, we are getting hit with very serious forms of chemical contamination from myriad other directions, ranging from toxic halogens deliberately placed in public drinking water, to harmful additives like aspartame and monosodium glutamate inserted into food, to poisons like mercury-laced Thimerosal and formaldehyde found in vaccines. Chemical contaminants typically have a multiplier effect in harming humans when combined with radiation from Fukushima and other sources.”
Major Fox said that according to Los Angeles-based journalist Michael Collins at EnviroReporter.com, chemtrails are even causing radionuclides to precipitate in dry areas like Death Valley.
“It is almost like the malevolent globalists described by Leuren Moret are saying `We are coming after all of America with our global depopulation program, even after those who seek refuge in the desert.’ He added, ‘If all this seems far-fetched, Americans have already been under a continuing stealth nuclear attack for decades that has been largely unreported by establishment media.’
Moret has explained how nuclear power plant emissions have caused people who live within a five kilometer radius of nuclear power plants to have more than twice the rate of radiation-related ailments compared to the rest of the population. Bomb test fallout has caused SAT scores to drop about 12% from radiation-related mental impairments in vast population groups. This radiation has also significantly bolstered infant mortality and cancer rates across America.
In an article written by Alfred Webre appearing at http://www.examiner.com/article/leuren-moret-nuclear-genocide-of-babies-children-japan-u-s-canada-grows , Moret is quoted as saying that “Dr. Ernest Sternglass was able to show that the decline in SAT scores was directly related to the amount of fission products released each year from bomb tests. The SAT scores never recovered after bomb testing ended because nuclear power plant fission products replaced bomb testing radioactive pollution.
“The annual average decline in the scores inversely correlates with the total kiloton equivalent of nuke tests conducted at the Nevada Test Site the same year. The lower the SAT score, the more radiation released in that year from bomb testing at the NTS.”
According to Moret, Fukushima radiation is now adding insult to injury. It has caused the readings of her Geiger counter inside her home in Berkeley, Calif. to show double the background radiation that it registered just prior to the Fukushima meltdowns.
As a means of protection against the ongoing nuclear and chemical assault, Major Fox has begun a campaign to persuade citizens to use respirators. He notes: “Admittedly, radionuclides in fallout usually come in the size of nanoparticles, which means that they are so small they can easily get absorbed through the skin or pass through gas mask filters. However, it is also true that they tend to attach themselves to rain droplets, mist and dust. Therefore, while a respirator certainly will not screen out all radionuclides, it can certainly screen out a significant amount, and every little bit helps to keep one’s `body burden’ of internal contamination as low as possible.
“Generally speaking, internal contamination is vastly more dangerous than external forms of radiation, because radioactive particles inside the body are continually firing off short-ranged ‘alpha’ and ‘beta’ as well as ‘gamma’ forms of radiation against adjacent cells 24/7, causing DNA disruptions that can cause cancers and other horrors, whereas external radiation usually consists mainly of long-ranged ‘gamma’ radiation similar to X-rays that people tend to experience during relatively brief periods.
“While there are a number of food supplements and drugs that can help flush out radioactive `heavy metals’ that get inside one’s body, unfortunately they can’t get everything out. Quite a few long-lived isotopes such as radioactive cesium, which tends to gravitate towards muscles; plutonium, which tends to gravitate towards the lung, liver, kidney, lymph, bone, and gonadal tissues; and radioactive strontium, which tends to accumulate in bones, can stay lodged in ones body doing damage 24/7 well beyond the day a person dies.
“If an internally contaminated person is cremated, these isotopes can go up the chimney and get breathed in by someone else, repeating the damage cycle. The radioactive isotope caesium-137, which constitutes a large percentage of Fukushima fallout, has a half-life of about 30 years. We have also been dosed with plutonium-239, which has a half-life of 24,100 years. Uranium-235 has a half-life of 703.8 million years. These are just some examples of the witches’ brew of long-lived radioactive isotopes that are still coming down around us, so obviously the radionuclide problem is not going to go away overnight.”
He added, “respirators can also provide important protection against various forms of biological attack, which will probably become a greater danger as more people suffer from compromised immune systems from radiation, all of which encourages the spread of pandemics.”
Major Fox has created a web page that provides more background on these issues entitled “Individual and Group Radiation Protection and Contamination Avoidance” that can be found online at http://tinyurl.com/7uwf4l5 .
Major Fox says he personally uses two forms of respirators and gets some interesting gawks when he wears them around town, but the public needs to be aware that the situation is serious. “Most people do not have a clue.”
Ever since Fukushima fallout started to hit America about a week after the March 11, 2011 meltdowns, United States residents with radiation detection devices have been detecting jumps in radiation levels from rain-soaked samples that have been vast multiples over normal background levels. One example reported on YouTube is “STAY OUT OF THE RAIN! Radioactive Fallout 49X Greater Than Background Radiation” posted April 14, 2012 by potrblog located St. Louis, Mo. at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjCf12WuRDw&feature=fvwrel
This same St. Louis, Mo. source also reported a significant pickup in radiation on a respirator he wore while mowing his backyard for two hours on a dry day in “Is Your Lawn Radioactive Too? N95 Dust Mask Test” posted on June 2, 2011 at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKTCS_CHXeY&feature=channel_video_title .
Fox described his two respirators:
“First, I bought a ‘Harmful Dust N95 Respirator with Exhalation Valve’ produced by MSA, listed at http://www.safetyworks.com/catalog/product503261.html. It only cost $6.99. According to instructions contained in the product packaging, ‘N95’ means it is rated by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (‘NIOSH’ at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NIOSH) to be at a ‘95% filter efficiency level against all particulate aerosols free of oil.’
“I also bought a P100-rated ‘Toxic Dust Respirator’ by MSA listed at http://www.safetyworks.com/catalog/product1124.html which cost me $39.99. In addition, I purchased a pack of replacement cartridges for $14.99. ‘P100’ means ‘Particulate Filter (99.97% filter efficiency level) effective against all particulate aerosols.’
He adds, “There are many other fine respirators that provide good values made by other companies, but I thought I would start with MSA in order to provide specific examples of product and price information.”
Fox noted that an excellent documentary entitled “On Fukushima Beach,” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-sPUawl6yg&feature=player_embedded#! has a number of video clips of pedestrians in Tokyo, some of whom are “wearing what look like Japanese counterparts to the N95 mask.”
WILLIAM B. FOX, a Fukushima radiation activist, wears his N95 respirator and a Civil Defense Alert sign. — Nathaniel Black Photography
“The thought occurred to me that given the continuing pattern of ‘hot rains’ we are experiencing across America we should see Americans doing the same thing, yet I have not yet seen one single person out on the streets wearing any kind of protective devices. Even the clerk who rang up my purchase at the hardware store that sells respirators knew absolutely nothing about the Fukushima radiation threat.”
He explained that if a person can get a significant increase over background radiation in his respirator just by mowing a dry yard on a clear day without any visible dust mobilization in the St. Louis area, “It is totally logical to me to strongly suspect that wearing respirators should become a daily practice everywhere in America for anyone who wants to protect his or her own health.
“Immediately after buying my respirators, I experimented with wearing them and discovered that I can breathe very easily with both of them, even to the point that I can wear them comfortably while doing strenuous exercises like push-ups and sit-ups with heavy breathing. However, the package instructions for the P100 state that one sign that it is time for a filter replacement is when the breathing becomes more difficult. Also, the MSA P100 filter has a red strip around it that is supposed to turn brown once it gets heavily contaminated, although this may only relate to the kinds of aerosolized contaminants that miners, painters, and other kinds of people who work around ordinary types of hazardous plumes and fumes encounter as opposed to the radionuclides encountered by nuclear workers or nuked populations like ourselves.
“I decided to establish a precedent for western Pennsylvania as a ‘Fukushima radiation demonstrator’ and started wearing both types of masks everywhere outside,” he said.
He has begun, too, to wear a sign that says “Fukushima radiation activist.” He also carries some handout literature to assist in his efforts to educate the public.
“Of course I have to use some common sense and flexibility in the way I go about wearing my respirators,” said Fox. “Given the current level of public ignorance, it is probably a very good idea for me to take my respirator off whenever I walk inside a bank to avoid triggering a call for the police, since I might appear like someone who is about to stage a holdup. I can also see how certain store managers might also be put on edge. I need to find a way to balance my right to protect myself and engage in public demonstration with the understandable concern that many store managers may feel about how my appearance could frighten away customers.”
Major Fox says that as he began pursuing his new “lifestyle,” a lot of other ideas and questions started occurring to him.
“First, why didn’t I start doing this back in March 2011 when the radiation first hit?’ he asked. “The answer of course is ignorance. I had no idea how hard we were getting hit with radioactive iodine, xenon, and myriad other isotopes.”
He did, however, make one very good move during this period. He got in touch with one of the world’s leading radiation experts, scientist Moret, who, he says, suggested that he start staying indoors and out of the rain. One problem for someone doing strenuous physical activity outdoors is “radioactive cesium uptake in the heart muscles. This has apparently been happening at an unusually high rate to many relatively young and otherwise fit athletes who have been dropping dead of heart attacks in our post-Fukushima melt-down era around the Northern Hemisphere in the middle of competitions or during training.”
He advises that “everyone should own both the N95 and the P100 respirators. The reason is that the N95 can be folded up and stuck in one’s pocket, and hence is easy to have on hand anywhere. In contrast, a P100 mask is much bulkier and heavier and of course not as compact. It is more likely when someone makes a quick dash out the door somewhere, like a quick run over to a local grocery store that it will be left behind.”
Major Fox explained that people need to always carry N95 respirators in their pockets, for situations when rainfall comes unexpectedly, since most radionuclides come down in the rain. The N95s “are so cheap, why would anyone not want to have one at all times?” Sudden gusts of wind, particularly when a lot of dust is getting kicked up, is another reason to wear the mask, he says, “especially with any wind speed over 5-10 mph since this is when many radionuclides get remobilized into the atmosphere.”
Major Fox says that after analyzing the horrible effects of radiation poisoning, a subject most Americans are not even aware of, he is now part of a new “counter culture” and encourages others to join him. “I am `countering’ the `culture’ of the establishment, which is essentially a criminal culture of denial, deception, and even global depopulation genocide.”
“When I wear a mask as I drive in my car or walk down the street in a downtown area, I am basically telling everybody that I am ‘opting out’ on a broader social level, completely outside the propaganda matrix and rebelling against people like Hillary Clinton who have signed on to the importation of radioactive food from Japan without any screening.”
“Instead of conducting a sit-down strike somewhere, such as in the troubled ‘Occupy Movement,’ we can make a different kind of social statement without becoming a public nuisance by simply wearing protective masks everywhere. This in essence says that we are not only protecting ourselves against Fukushima radiation, but also protesting the toxic society and toxic establishment that have created this horrible mess to begin with,” explained Fox.
Fukushima: Radiation, Politics, & PR
By Leuren Moret, Dr. Majia Nadesan and Jim Fetzer (with Major William Fox)
Jim Fetzer has posted his recent interview by two top radiation specialists on the Veterans Today “Military and Foreign Affairs Journal” website, which includes the audio version and a printed transcript.
Discussed in detail were the radiation effects of the Japanese Fukushima disaster and the fashion in which its fallout has been covered up both by the Japanese and the American governments.
Featured guests on “The Real Deal” program hosted by Fetzer included:
Leuren Moret, an independent geoscientist who has done expert studies on the Fukushima disaster and radiation problems around the world including depleted uranium, and
Dr. Majia Nadesan, PhD., a professor of communication in the Division of Social and Behavioral Sciences in the New College of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences at Arizona State University, who has studied Fukushima extensively.
“What they had to tell us smacks of politics and public relations and is profoundly disturbing,” noted Fetzer.
The segment included an introduction by Major William Fox (former USMCR commissioned officer), who, said Fetzer, “was instrumental in arranging this interview. His key point is that the first line of defense to handle any major crisis is accurate information. Tragically, not only has accurate information been deliberately withheld from Americans regarding the Fukushima crisis, but they have also been steadily fed disinformation.”
Rather than reproducing the entire interview in The Iconoclast, this link takes readers to the Veterans Today website and Part 1 of the interview. Part 2 can be accessed once on the site.
Civilians Not Protected From DU Exploitation
A new report entitled Hazard Aware explains that civilian populations are not being protected from exploitation caused by the use of depleted uranium munitions in war zones. Other studies show that radiation from depleted uranium use travels in the air and afflicts inhabitants of other countries.
For years world scientists have decried the dangers of depleted uranium contamination only to be ignored by governments which took a “strike first, clean-up later” attitude. One scientist, Chris Busby, was able to obtain documentation proving that the radiation caused by “shock and awe” in Iraq had traveled all the way to London and beyond.
In the mid-1970s, depleted uranium testing on solders at Fort Hood, Texas was conducted in secret by the military, to determine thresholds of contamination effect.
U.S. Department of Defense clean-up of contaminated areas after the first Gulf war proved impossible, according to personnel in the field.
The latest report, published by the International Coalition to Ban Uranium Weapons, contains research done by IKV Pax Christi, which collected military manuals and guidelines on how to deal with depleted uranium contamination from six different armed forces and includes NATO guidelines.
The outcome, according to Wim Zwijnenburg, contains lessons learned from military field manuals on depleted uranium and how to move forward for civilian protection norms due to the potential negative effects on health and environment.
The report encourages the implementation of strict hygiene procedures to avoid DU exposure, with detailed instructions on how to deal with accidents that may occur during transportation and storage of DU.
Noted Zwijnenburg, “Considering the chemical toxicity and radioactivity of DU, this all makes perfect sense. Precautionary measures should be undertaken to keep exposure as low as possible.”
According to the report, “Centuries ago, armies were fighting armies on a battleground outside of civilian areas. But with new weapon technologies and change of conflict dynamics and battlegrounds, nowadays 90% of the victims of armed conflict are civilians. While soldiers have all sorts of means at their disposition to protect themselves during and after armed conflict, civilians are barely protected against the range of weapons deployed, such as depleted uranium (DU).”
The report published by IKV Pax Christi reveals this gap and provides civilian centered strategies for protection against exposure to DU.
“Not surprisingly, armed forces have strict guidelines. These have to protect troops against a range of explosive and chemical residues, including those resulting from the use of landmines, cluster munitions, unexploded ordnance’s (UXOs) and nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons in case they are deployed. The guidelines are drawn up to protect the troops against exposure and limit the potential harm posed by these weapons. Clearance operations during and after armed conflict are developed to remove these weapons from the battlefield, especially because of harmful effects on civilians living in areas where the weapons have been deployed. A majority of states have recognized these threats, hence the ban on landmines and cluster munitions and several conventions on chemical, biological, and toxic weapons.
“Quite interestingly, depleted uranium (DU) munitions are still considered legitimate conventional weapons. Despite ongoing debates in the UN, several bans on DU by states and an international campaign to ban DU weapons, little interest is shown to tackle this issue once and for all. The main reason given by states for this inertia is that a clear link between the use of these weapons and their potential effect on health and environment is not proven. Nonetheless, most of the armed forces operating in areas where DU has been used or suspected to have been used have guidelines in place to protect their troops against contamination with DU.”
Although guidelines exist for the military, “none of these guidelines are available for civilians living in contaminated areas that are likely to be exposed to these hazardous materials on a daily basis. Over the past 25 years, DU has been used in the Balkans and Iraq, leaving over 400.000 kg of DU in the soil, and contaminated scrap is stored inside populated areas.
“During the course of the last two decades, numerous reports from those areas expressed concerns amongst citizens over the potential effects of those weapons, linking it to an increased numbers of cancers and birth deformations in their communities. But what is lacking is research and work by affected states to clean up those areas, remediation measures for contaminated sites and scrap yards, and research on exposure of civilians to DU.
“Based on the military precautionary measures, IKV Pax Christi’s report provides civilian centered strategies for protection against exposure to DU and makes recommendations for further work on DU in affected area’s, basic procedures such as transparency over the locations where DU was used, assessment of the contaminated sites, clean up operations and awareness raising for the local population. Until today, on most of the sites in the Balkans and Iraq, few of these procedures have been implemented, resulting in continued exposure of civilians to toxic remnants of war, and an international community that fails to act.
“IKV Pax Christi strongly believes that DU is an unacceptable component of conventional weapons, and calls upon the international community to apply a precautionary approach to DU and ban these weapons as well as provide assistance to the affected countries in cleaning up DU munitions, hence minimizing the harm for civilians to exposure to DU in and after armed conflict.”
The report notes that uranium weapons release large volumes of fine particles into the environment when they are used. Uranium is a radioactive and chemically toxic heavy metal. It has a similar density to gold. This has made it an attractive choice for producers of armor-piercing weapons known as Kinetic Energy penetrators. The penetrator is a long dart of solid depleted uranium; it is neither a tip, nor a coating and weighs up to 4kg. Kinetic Energy Penetrators use their kinetic energy to pierce armour instead of a chemical explosive. Uranium’s other key property is that it is pyrophoric. Pyrophoric materials oxidize rapidly when exposed to oxygen, this means finely ground uranium powder burns when exposed to air.
It is this last property that is responsible for the generation of fine, radioactive and chemically toxic particles. Once released on battlefields and testing ranges, these particles can then be ingested or inhaled by civilians and service personnel alike. Rounds that miss their targets may also corrode in the soil and contaminate groundwater.
The problem is being documented in dozens of recently published peer-reviewed papers that have indicated that uranium can damage health through new and unexpected pathways.
Reports from hospitals in Iraq have linked uranium weapon contamination with a rise in the incidence of cancers often associated with environmental contaminants and radiation, such as leukemia, lymphoma, and breast cancer. Furthermore, the age at which Iraqis have developed cancer has been decreasing.
Dozens of veterans have tested positive for uranium exposure and have been seen to be exhibiting a range of symptoms. In Italy, the state has agreed to a 30m Euro compensation package for service personnel suffering from Balkan Syndrome, this was thought to be connected with uranium exposure. The decision was made all the more notable after an expert panel concluded that the burden of proof in these cases should be reversed and the military made to prove that sick personnel had not been exposed.
Although states that use uranium weapons have been unwilling to undertake surveys of contaminated populations, there is now sufficient data to request that governments take a precautionary approach and introduce a moratorium on the use of these weapons. A precautionary approach is also supported by the fact that uranium dust is almost impossible to remove from the environment once released.
For an extensive list of recently published peer-reviewed papers visit: http://www.bandepleteduranium.org/en/docs/58.pdf
For more information about depleted uranium, visit http://links.causes.com/s/clD3bq?r=Mlh3
It is thought that the United States and the United Kingdom are the only states to have used uranium weapons in active conflict, although questions remain over France’s use of uranium weapons in the Gulf War and Russia’s in Chechnya. They were first used on a large scale by U.S. and UK forces in the 1991 Gulf War, by NATO in the Balkans in the late 1990s and again by U.S. and UK forces in the 2003 Iraq War. It is suspected that they may have also been used in Afghanistan since 2001.
Uranium weapons are in use by at least 17, and as many as 20 countries. Some states have developed them independently while others have bought U.S. and Soviet-made munitions. The opacity of the arms trade has meant that this data is far from complete.
States thought to have uranium weapons include: UK, U.S., France, Russia, Belarus, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Oman, Egypt, Kuwait, Pakistan, Thailand, China, India, Belarus, and Taiwan.
ICBUW suggests that a uranium weapons treaty that will synthesize the impressive human rights and victim assistance text of the Cluster Munition Convention with environmental law and the Precautionary Principle – this would be a first for disarmament law and would have a huge impact on the wider issue of the use of toxic substances in warfare.
“A Uranium Weapons Convention would ban the use of uranium in all conventional weapons and armor, release money for environmental remediation and medical care and order the destruction of stockpiles.”
Two UN General Assembly resolutions, one highlighting health concerns and the other requesting the World Health Organization, International Atomic Energy Agency, and United Nations Environment Program to update their positions on uranium weapons. The resolutions passed by 126 to six and 141 to four respectively.
Four increasingly strong resolutions in the European Parliament, the most recent in May 2007 called for a moratorium leading to a ban and passed by 94% of MEPs.
A domestic ban on uranium weapons occurred recently in Belgium; they were also the first state in the world to ban land mines and cluster bombs.
Texas Author Takes On Toxic Landscape
MIDLOTHIAN, Texas — Alexandra Allred is author of a new book, Damaged Goods, in which she dips into her years of experience raising three children – and battling corporate polluters in Midlothian, Texas – to write a story about pollution busting.
“When my son became ill, I was convinced the toxic waste being dumped near our home was the cause. When I brought my concerns to the local politicians, they introduced me to the loopholes that allow toxic waste to be dumped in our back yards. I hate loopholes.”
In addition to being a wife, mother, first U.S. Olympic women’s bobsled champion, 4thdegree black belt and accomplished author, Allred routinely travels to Washington, D.C. to speak before the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and meet with senators regarding her concerns about toxic waste and the policies that allow it to fester.
“The competitive beast in me came out when certain senators refused to talk to me because they were taking money from the polluters,” states Allred. “It’s as if they believe selfishness and stupidity justify harming others. Hard to believe isn’t it? So, I had to write about it.”
The tension-filled Damaged Goods explores:
Public health and moral responsibility: how, in pursuit of profits, big business buys the right to make Texans sick every day.
How David felt when he saw Goliath: what we can do to stand up against big corporate polluters – and win!
The importance of laughter, friendship and perseverance in the face of a life-threatening struggle.
Protecting Mother Nature: our global obligation to create a clean earth for our children’s children and beyond.
About the Author:
Alexandra Allred is a pioneer in women’s bobsledding, and the first woman in the history of the sport to be named U.S. National Champion and Athlete of the Year by the United States Olympic Committee – while 4 ½ months pregnant. The daughter of a now-retired U.S. diplomat, Allred has been featured on/in ESPN, HBO Sports, Sports Illustrated, and countless book, magazine and newspaper profiles. She routinely travels to Washington, D.C. to meet with Senators, speak before the United States Environmental Protection Agency and lobby on Capitol Hill.
Damaged Goods is currently available for pre-order via The Writer’s Coffee Shop Publishing House, and recently became available via all major online retailers as of October 11, 2012.
Anti-Vaccine Campaign Growing
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Independent studies are finding that vaccines are causing more problems than they are remedying, frequently causing diseases in otherwise healthy individuals, ruining their lives.
Pro-pharmaceutical elected officials have been fast to pass bills that will enhance drug company profits, leaving citizens to pay the cost, not only of the drugs bought, but with lives lost or maimed forever.
According to Eileen Dannemann, director, National Coalition of Organized Women, “Are you sometimes feeling dis-empowered by the relentless force of the establishment to pass unconstitutional bills eroding our rights for exemptions; passing bills that make it legal for schools to give vaccines to underage children without parent’s consent or knowledge (California); passing legislation that forces parents to go to the doctor to get a ‘religious exemption’?
“A few years ago, a guy from California contacted us. He had made up these decals on his own steam and put them on his new Toyota truck.”
The decals tell those who see the car: “The Greatest Lie Ever Told — That Vaccines Are Safe and Effective.”
Dannemann asked, “You or a relative or friend have a vaccine-injured Autistic, ADHD, Bipolar, Asthmatic, juvenile diabetes child? You are spending a fortune on treatments; you are mad as hell, and you are besides yourself trying to get people, government, your school, your pediatrician to listen up!”
She explained that the Vaccine Liberation Army (www.vaccineliberationarmy.com) “can have any iteration of these high end, outdoor quality decals made for you at a really cheap price. We recommend the above text which our experience shows that it is highly effective in putting an impulse of doubt about the effectiveness of vaccines into people’s minds…even the medically sold-out elderly.
“We can arrange it for you and in a few weeks. You are all set to blow the establishment out of the water as cars and trucks on the road increases.
“Just think of the impact that one car can make in your town, alone. Just think if we had hundreds of parents within our movement starting to make this kind of HARDCORE commitment across the nation. You know, the reality is we are in a battle…and we can only win, as Dr. Palevsky and Dr. Mercola say, that parents need to rise to inform the community and educate their own pediatricians. We have to rise from the bottom up.
“The mental coherence and health of the entire emerging generation is at stake, here. Twenty-five percent (and growing) of children are now on psyche drugs due to the establishment’s purposeful misdiagnosis of “mental illness” rather than vaccine injury.”
Keyhole Garden Video Stars Texas Actress
CLIFTON, Texas – A young Texas actress, Brianne Harvey, has taken to the Internet to promote what she feels is the future in raising crops – keyhole gardening.
The 14-year-old recently accepted a starring role in the You Tube video entitled “Open The Door To The Future…Keyhole Gardening.” Here she explains and demonstrates the advantages of something dear to her heart — keyhole gardens. “I love them,” she said. “They are fascinating. “
The youngster wants to pass on the reminder that fall gardens can be the best, especially the keyhole variety, so she urges the public to consider planting for fall, which needs to be done soon.
POSSIBILITIES ABOUND when raising crops in a keyhole garden, which is illustrated in this garden located at Keyholefarm.com’s Central Texas location earlier this year.
She said that keyhole gardens are easy to tend and, by design, the concept takes recycling to the hilt. Other advantages include substantial water conservation, the ability to plant crops closer together and within easy reach, and less weeding and backbreaking work.
“Brianne” (as she likes to be called) explained that the younger generation – her generation – can “really get into” this new approach to learning about agriculture. “It is an important step in re-establishing an old link to the past, one our forefathers believed in.”
Keyhole gardening began a few years ago as an experimental venture at a school in Lesotho, Africa, but has now spread to the United States and is catching on like wildfire, the actress explained. “Schools here are now getting into the act, utilizing keyholes to teach students about geography, mathematics, science, and economics as they pertain to agriculture.
“This is so valuable,” she commented. “It’s something that stays with you always, like riding a bicycle, and we really need inspirations in traditional values in this country right now so I am happy to tell the world about keyhole gardens.”
The 4:54-minute video provides useful details about the concept of keyhole gardens, their design, and how they work. The video was sponsored by Keyholefarm.com, which provided the images used in the project.
The video can be found at www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVTQxstJ1Ck.
Brianne Harvey has appeared in two television commercials, one for Pilgrim’s Pride chicken and one for a political movement, a Baylor University play entitled “Six Characters In Search Of An Author,” her school’s one-act play competition, and various other acting venues over several years. She wants to expand her acting into a full-time career.
