from here to peace

The right have an advantage at the moment. It's not at all tough for them to embody their values. Among their confreres, they can support big business, war, anti abortion laws, lie, cheat, and commit all kinds of crimes against justice for profit and the sake of all that makes money for them. The left has to represent all that is humanitarian and positive. In the world of modern politics such virtues seem laughable, the naive liberal environmentalist geek, no head for business, no heart for the real issues or stamina for the tough challenges of our nasty world. The core of the left is non agressive. Love may not force but is inevitably irresistable in the relief and limitless power it restores. I often say, we don't even know what we can do

There are people attracted to the right for very noble reasons. My oil man for instance I look up to for deeply good human values. Recently he admitted to me that he supports the Bush adminstration whole heartedly. This man supplies heavy duty oil to a cross section of my community, gets knee deep in this very unhealthy substance for us probably often 7 days a week , took over for his dad I bet twenty years ago or more. Is used to making big compromises, endangering his health for the sake of his family and community. He and I used to chat happily til this recent revelation; I'm betting he's been duking it out over the past eight years with those much tougher than me, God forbid including (I'm only imagining) close family members. Anyway, he doesn't want to engage anymore, and I'm heart broken, such is the climate now vis a vis adherance to one or another political train of thought. But soon it will come down to very basic human survival , and my friendly oilman will not be able to be fooled any longer. Soon the veil of rhetoric will lift, the fog of war blow out to sea and all will stand or fall on the side of their effectiveness. Are they life affirming? Do they promote health and happiness? Security? Unity? Wellbeing? Confidence? Go from there. If some key inventions of the last hundred years had been allowed to flourish, my oilman would have been involving himself in nontoxic energy solutions.

The left could be alot more confident. For instance when the right claims the left has no ideas, the correct response is, the left has all the ideas. The right only parrots the ideas of the left to seem to care about the same things, health care, children's rights and education, economic growth and stability, the environment, world stability and cultural harmony, global synergy, a game in which the left would do well to stop playing stooge. We need to brazenly publicize all the things those who wave the banner of the fool do: all the strange technology, networks of crazy operatives, undercover beaurocracies, just to name a few ill represented possibilities purveyed by those who need to mask their campaign to subourne all human intuition and instinct to maintain an exclusive, callous, brutal value system that empowers and pays them lavishly. The left needs to show up at the threshholds of their borders and bear witness openly to the entire scope of the shinanigans, the whole truth, nothing omitted, expose the skeleton and fingernails, platform shoes, tupees and dentures, micro chips and steroids, the entirety, the bulk of the matter, so the extravagantly enormous effort they're bringing to bear to sustain so much unecessary pain can be fully appreciated.

Finally, the very best and only way to bring around those caught up in the whirl of false magesty is to embody constructive values, the continuous revelation of the power of life, that illdefined requisite, love, and it's companions compassion and forgiveness, humility and truth. They are so essential, the rewards so great, no challenge will ever meet or overshadow them. They are the basis for all illusions, all addictions, they are our ultimate goal. Unselfishness, simplicity, innocence, purity, honesty are our natural impulses, the thwarting of which is at the root of all madness. They live in the sigh of relief at the return to loved ones, those who think highly of us, understand us, forgive us, want to be kind to us, encourage, heal and teach us. Those we trust. These returns can be world wide. I pray often that those of us in goverment and other positions of power be touched by the spirit of the creator so that none can ever again think of another without empathy, never look at a wilderness and think, I can make so much money off this valley or mountain top, or riverbed regardless of the expense to all natural life there. Never choose dollars over sense. Never make a move without consulting the heart. Include the creator in all policies and actions, not in a religious way but a deeply personal way. The result I am confident will be astonishingly, envigoratingly beautiful and abundant beyond our wildest dreams.