IRON SKILLET,
Time to eat,
Trucker hustling waitress,
Bullshit thick,
His eyes undressing her,
The primal monkey dance
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Monday, August 8, 2011
CIVILIZATION
Cross-country drive,
Giant billboards screaming
XXX Adult Store,
Ethanol tainted petrol,
Hearts over signs selling sandwiches,
Roadside crosses named Billy, Bob and Charlotte.
Scenic route,
One-hundred miles of hell,
Traffic lights galore,
Road lined by chain food, gas, you name it.
"America the Beautiful"
Giant billboards screaming
XXX Adult Store,
Ethanol tainted petrol,
Hearts over signs selling sandwiches,
Roadside crosses named Billy, Bob and Charlotte.
Scenic route,
One-hundred miles of hell,
Traffic lights galore,
Road lined by chain food, gas, you name it.
"America the Beautiful"
INTRODUCTION TO ROLLING COMMENTARIES, 2011 EDITION
In my thirty-nine year medical career, I studied much, listened to many, reflected and synthesized. In 1996, the cosmic computer pressed print, and words began to flow through me and onto paper.
As I approach retirement, professional constraints are lifting, and all that I am can become visible. My favorite motto for this process is "let it rip."
I was reared in rural Oklahoma, a shameful fact in my young mind, so I attempted to eradicate my roots with education.
Even worse, I was born female, a birth defect in my patriarchal origins. Therefore, I had to be as good as or better than any man. Brains were my winning ticket.
After fifteen years of college and professional training and many years of living, I developed insight, into myself and others. When used for the highest good of all concerned, an educated mind is a blessing. However, there are many recipients of excellent educations with bloated egos, who spew forth on any and all topics, as if they were supreme authorities. Actually, they have barely skimmed the surface of true understanding or wisdom.
I am no longer impressed by any one's education or the amount of money in their bank account. I am more interested by the nature of their soul and their ability to be loving, kind and compassionate to all.
As the years passed, I came to value my country roots. Oklahomans' feet are firmly planted in the red earth. They also have good, common, horse sense and a belly-laughing sense of the absurd.
As for being a woman, I consider my gender to be one of my greatest assets. Women, more often than men, tend to listen to and follow their intuitions, their inner knowings. I, along with many others, consider intuition to be the highest form of intelligence and a direct extension of the collective unconscious, which is also called the Akashic Field and Divine Intelligence.
ROLLING COMMENTARIES: This title is based on my travels in life and on the planet. I spend much of my time in silence and solitude, my form of meditation, and a myriad of thoughts and topics flow into my consciousness.
In the springs and summers of 2009 and 2010, I travelled five times to the coast of North Carolina. The following series, which includes over fifty pieces, came to me during those travels. This series will be followed by many others.
The "Addendums" are personal notes made the date of the blog's post.
May your journeys be blessed.
Linda Bowlby, M.D.
As I approach retirement, professional constraints are lifting, and all that I am can become visible. My favorite motto for this process is "let it rip."
I was reared in rural Oklahoma, a shameful fact in my young mind, so I attempted to eradicate my roots with education.
Even worse, I was born female, a birth defect in my patriarchal origins. Therefore, I had to be as good as or better than any man. Brains were my winning ticket.
After fifteen years of college and professional training and many years of living, I developed insight, into myself and others. When used for the highest good of all concerned, an educated mind is a blessing. However, there are many recipients of excellent educations with bloated egos, who spew forth on any and all topics, as if they were supreme authorities. Actually, they have barely skimmed the surface of true understanding or wisdom.
I am no longer impressed by any one's education or the amount of money in their bank account. I am more interested by the nature of their soul and their ability to be loving, kind and compassionate to all.
As the years passed, I came to value my country roots. Oklahomans' feet are firmly planted in the red earth. They also have good, common, horse sense and a belly-laughing sense of the absurd.
As for being a woman, I consider my gender to be one of my greatest assets. Women, more often than men, tend to listen to and follow their intuitions, their inner knowings. I, along with many others, consider intuition to be the highest form of intelligence and a direct extension of the collective unconscious, which is also called the Akashic Field and Divine Intelligence.
ROLLING COMMENTARIES: This title is based on my travels in life and on the planet. I spend much of my time in silence and solitude, my form of meditation, and a myriad of thoughts and topics flow into my consciousness.
In the springs and summers of 2009 and 2010, I travelled five times to the coast of North Carolina. The following series, which includes over fifty pieces, came to me during those travels. This series will be followed by many others.
The "Addendums" are personal notes made the date of the blog's post.
May your journeys be blessed.
Linda Bowlby, M.D.
Sunday, April 3, 2011
GRAFT OR LOBBYING, IS THERE ANY DIFFERENCE?
General Electric, the nation's largest corporation, has a "giant tax department" and employs former IRS and Treasury Department officials and former members of Congressional tax-writing committees. Of course, these "employees" have knowledge on many levels and very powerful political connections. Then you add to this mix, millions of dollars for "lobbying," and what do you have? Tax loopholes to G.E.'s advantage.(1)
Since 2002, G.E. has eliminated a fifth of its U.S. workforce and moved the jobs overseas. During that time, G.E.'s offshore profits have risen from $15 billion to $92 billion, with no tax paid on funds kept "offshore."(2)
In 2010, G.E. made $14.2 billion in world-wide profits, but its tax bill was zero. In fact, G.E. claimed $3.2 billion in tax credits, which leaves the average American worker to shoulder the nation's tax burden.(3)
With Wall Street's shenanigans and high U.S. unemployment over the last two years, Americans have lost jobs, homes, savings and sometimes their lives.
When a U.S. citizen purchases items in Target, Walmart, Hobby Lobby or any large U.S. corporate chain, over 90% of the goods are manufactured abroad, usually in Asia or the Middle East, occasionally in South America or Africa.
These manufactured goods are then shipped to the U.S., at an enormous environmental cost, and priced to undercut goods manufactured in the U.S. A hefty carbon tax on products manufactured abroad would help the environment, level the economic playing field and increase U.S.employment.
Eliminating tax loopholes for corporations, would enormously increase Federal tax revenues and fund education and other social services.
G.E. employs "former" political insiders of the IRS, Treasury Department and Congressional tax-writing committees and stacks the deck in its and other corporations favor. Then, you add millions in "lobbying." It sounds like graft to me.
Notes 1-3: New York Times, 3/25/11, A-1,A17.
Since 2002, G.E. has eliminated a fifth of its U.S. workforce and moved the jobs overseas. During that time, G.E.'s offshore profits have risen from $15 billion to $92 billion, with no tax paid on funds kept "offshore."(2)
In 2010, G.E. made $14.2 billion in world-wide profits, but its tax bill was zero. In fact, G.E. claimed $3.2 billion in tax credits, which leaves the average American worker to shoulder the nation's tax burden.(3)
With Wall Street's shenanigans and high U.S. unemployment over the last two years, Americans have lost jobs, homes, savings and sometimes their lives.
When a U.S. citizen purchases items in Target, Walmart, Hobby Lobby or any large U.S. corporate chain, over 90% of the goods are manufactured abroad, usually in Asia or the Middle East, occasionally in South America or Africa.
These manufactured goods are then shipped to the U.S., at an enormous environmental cost, and priced to undercut goods manufactured in the U.S. A hefty carbon tax on products manufactured abroad would help the environment, level the economic playing field and increase U.S.employment.
Eliminating tax loopholes for corporations, would enormously increase Federal tax revenues and fund education and other social services.
G.E. employs "former" political insiders of the IRS, Treasury Department and Congressional tax-writing committees and stacks the deck in its and other corporations favor. Then, you add millions in "lobbying." It sounds like graft to me.
Notes 1-3: New York Times, 3/25/11, A-1,A17.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
PLUTOCRACY
In the United States, we do not have a democracy. We have a plutocracy. Like marionettes, we are controlled by a few very wealthy families and the government officals they influence and/or purchase.
Individuals addicted to money and power have been labeled "triple-A self-aggrandizers" by archaeologist Brian Hayden. Hayden describes triple-As as arrogant, aggressive, acquisitive, alarming and ambitious about getting their way.1
A professor at British Columbia's Simon Fraser University, Hayden realized the rich and the powerful, the triple-As, bent laws, exploited neighbors and seized every little advantage.2
Hayden concluded that "triple-A self-agrandizers have created the world as we know it. But in their other lives as pirates, these same people have caused 90% of the world's problems." In their greed, they "ruin the lives of others, erode society and culture and degrade the environment."3
America's history is rife with triple-As. Economics professor, Robert Heilbroner, stated that America's 19th century robber barons used "deception, violence, kidnapping and extraordinary dishonesty to gain economic power and industrial supremacy. Robber barons bore such names as Astor, Carnegie, Ford, Morgan, Rockefeller and Vanderbilt.
Former President George W. Bush is fourth generation wealth created from the sale of munitions and oil dating back to World War I. As CIA director, vice president and president, one of George H.W. Bush's priorities was U.S. weapons trade and secret arms deals with Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the moujahedeen of Afghanistan. The Bushes' oil interests are heavily invested in the Middle East.
In 1991, as George H.W. Bush's Secretary of Defense, Dick Cheney orchestrated the bombing of Iraq in Operation Desert Storm. Many believe this action was aimed at securing U.S. oil interests in the Persian Gulf.
In 1995, Chaney became CEO of the Halliburton Company. After leaving that position, Cheney continued to own shares in the conglomerate and its financial interests in the Balkans, Persian Gulf and Caspian Sea.
In 2005, the U.S. Justice Department made allegations that Halliburton unlawfully received special treatment for work contracts, often no-bid contracts, in Iraq, Kuwait and the Balkans. An example of such favoritism includes Halliburton's $18 billion worth of contracts in Iraq, $7 billion of which went into the building of oil-infrastructures. I doubt that the run-of-the-mill American taxpayer received much benefit from the latter $7 billion.
In 2000, Cheney also sat on the board of Lockheed Martin, the world's largest military contractor and the world's largest arms exporter. No doubt, Cheney had less than altruistic motives for being on the Lockheed board.
No matter the cost in human lives and the viability of the environment and the planet, oil and war are big bucks for the world's triple-A self-aggrandizers.
We have seen the Democratic Clinton administration's federal surplus dissolve into the Republican George W. Bush administration's multi-trillion dollar deficits. To achieve this deficit, Bush gave himself and his cronies tax cuts, engaged the United States in two wars, Iraq and Afghanistan, and deregulated banks, Wall Street and other businesses, which resulted in "The Recession" of 2008.
Now, with ultimate gall, these same Republicans, who supported George W. and Cheney, are bouncing up and down about our nation's debt, which they created, and are demanding huge cuts in the federal budget, especially targeting health care, education, Social Security, Medicare and the needs of lower income mothers and children.
On the state level, these Republicans are on a rampage to destroy the collective bargaining power of state unions and to squeeze the middle class into non-existence.
Where do these people get off? Do they have a conscience? Apparently, they do not. Such are the triple-As and the plutocratic governments they spawn.
1. Smithsonian, Blame the Rich, 12/07, 102-109.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
Individuals addicted to money and power have been labeled "triple-A self-aggrandizers" by archaeologist Brian Hayden. Hayden describes triple-As as arrogant, aggressive, acquisitive, alarming and ambitious about getting their way.1
A professor at British Columbia's Simon Fraser University, Hayden realized the rich and the powerful, the triple-As, bent laws, exploited neighbors and seized every little advantage.2
Hayden concluded that "triple-A self-agrandizers have created the world as we know it. But in their other lives as pirates, these same people have caused 90% of the world's problems." In their greed, they "ruin the lives of others, erode society and culture and degrade the environment."3
America's history is rife with triple-As. Economics professor, Robert Heilbroner, stated that America's 19th century robber barons used "deception, violence, kidnapping and extraordinary dishonesty to gain economic power and industrial supremacy. Robber barons bore such names as Astor, Carnegie, Ford, Morgan, Rockefeller and Vanderbilt.
Former President George W. Bush is fourth generation wealth created from the sale of munitions and oil dating back to World War I. As CIA director, vice president and president, one of George H.W. Bush's priorities was U.S. weapons trade and secret arms deals with Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the moujahedeen of Afghanistan. The Bushes' oil interests are heavily invested in the Middle East.
In 1991, as George H.W. Bush's Secretary of Defense, Dick Cheney orchestrated the bombing of Iraq in Operation Desert Storm. Many believe this action was aimed at securing U.S. oil interests in the Persian Gulf.
In 1995, Chaney became CEO of the Halliburton Company. After leaving that position, Cheney continued to own shares in the conglomerate and its financial interests in the Balkans, Persian Gulf and Caspian Sea.
In 2005, the U.S. Justice Department made allegations that Halliburton unlawfully received special treatment for work contracts, often no-bid contracts, in Iraq, Kuwait and the Balkans. An example of such favoritism includes Halliburton's $18 billion worth of contracts in Iraq, $7 billion of which went into the building of oil-infrastructures. I doubt that the run-of-the-mill American taxpayer received much benefit from the latter $7 billion.
In 2000, Cheney also sat on the board of Lockheed Martin, the world's largest military contractor and the world's largest arms exporter. No doubt, Cheney had less than altruistic motives for being on the Lockheed board.
No matter the cost in human lives and the viability of the environment and the planet, oil and war are big bucks for the world's triple-A self-aggrandizers.
We have seen the Democratic Clinton administration's federal surplus dissolve into the Republican George W. Bush administration's multi-trillion dollar deficits. To achieve this deficit, Bush gave himself and his cronies tax cuts, engaged the United States in two wars, Iraq and Afghanistan, and deregulated banks, Wall Street and other businesses, which resulted in "The Recession" of 2008.
Now, with ultimate gall, these same Republicans, who supported George W. and Cheney, are bouncing up and down about our nation's debt, which they created, and are demanding huge cuts in the federal budget, especially targeting health care, education, Social Security, Medicare and the needs of lower income mothers and children.
On the state level, these Republicans are on a rampage to destroy the collective bargaining power of state unions and to squeeze the middle class into non-existence.
Where do these people get off? Do they have a conscience? Apparently, they do not. Such are the triple-As and the plutocratic governments they spawn.
1. Smithsonian, Blame the Rich, 12/07, 102-109.
2. Ibid.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
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