CIA Interrogations

It has been widely reported in global news media that the US Attorney General has hired a prosecutor to investigate alleged interrogation abuses by the CIA. I can accept that if a prisoner died, then there needs to be an investigation. I can also accept that the use of interrogation techniques such as water-boarding do lie in the grey area between right and wrong. Hence this grey area needs to be clarified. Unfortunately under the former Bush administration this was done in a way that appears suspect, and probably is suspect.

The system under which CIA techniques were formulated and enacted probably was suspect: with a person like Dick Cheney wielding influence behind the scene; with unclear communication channels between the Department of Justice and the Bush administration; and with a clear lack of communication between Congress and the White House. This lack of clarity in direction means that the CIA operatives that actually have to interrogate detainees have no clear framework to work under. They have been asked to operate in a foggy grey area, and that was what they did. By definition they are therefore in general not responsible. There may be, as previously mentioned, specific instances that are outside this foggy grey area. However this does not require a special prosecutor.

It has previously been reported that techniques used included loud heavy metal music, and slamming a persons back against a wall in a manner that sounds worse than it actually is. It is now reported that all sorts of fear tactics have been used: threatening to kill a persons children; threatening to sexually assault a person’s mother; and displaying a gun and a power drill in a session.

In most of the news reports it is implied that these threats a clearly reprehensible. However what is not made so clear is that these are only threats and there is absolutely no intention of carrying out such threats. I know that even reading or writing about these techniques can be itself a harsh experience. However the sort of individual that carries out a terrorist act has a mentality that would not only devise such techniques, but actually carry them out. Certainly if a suspected terrorist is a terrorist, then they would have a sufficiently thick skin that threats like above mentioned would not have the same effect that they would have on a normal person. Of course a detainee may be innocent. Hence the harshness of the interrogation technique needs to balances the seriousness of the possible crime against the possibility of innocence – and the imminence of a potential threat. The use of threats is to me not even in the grey area.

It was also reported that a mock execution was used, but was unsuccessful because it looked like it was staged. I suggest that the interrogators take up some acting lessons.

The opposition to harsh interrogation is strong because torture is so horrendous. Harsh interrogation therefore needs to be devised in such a way that it works subtly on a person’s body and emotions. This is what a lot of the techniques (that have been portrayed as obviously being in the grey area or even clearly torture) have been designed to do.

No-one likes the idea of harsh interrogation, but what is often left out is that innocent victims are also tortured at the hands of terrorists.

Islam and the West

This is in response to an article by the Iranian political scientist Nazanin Amirian published in the online at “Publico.es” on the 4th July 2009.

The author presents a viewpoint that is very similar to arguments presented by the Iranian foreign minister a couple of years ago in the Opinion section of (I think) the International Herald Tribune.

I do not recall the content of the foreign ministers letter. However what I do recall was that it was full of lies and omissions. It is for this reason that I feel obliged to the case recently put forward by Amirian.

The concept put forward is that the West (primarily the United States) is attempting to dominate the world (include Muslim countries) through military force.

I here only respond to the lies that are found in Amirian’s position.

Amirian argues that the concept of the Muslim or Islamic world is a Western concept that “we” do not recognize. Who is the “we” that Amirian is referring too. It is argued that unlike the geographically correct notion of the West, the concept of Islam is an erroneous concept used to further devious military domination. If the concept of ‘the West’ refers to the United States (and presumably also the United Kingdom), then what about South America and Africa?

Also, even though the Pakistani way of life may well more resemble the Hindu’s of India than the Muslims of Morocco, this in no way falsifies the fact that Pakistan and Morocco are both countries where Islam is the state religion. The concept of generalisation, or indeed its opposite, is used to foster understanding. A generalisation may become an over-simplification. However its use by rational human beings is to create understanding out of simplification.

Amirian argues that the so called war on terror does not refer to Islamic terror in Indonesia. In terms of casualties to ‘Westeners’ by ‘Islamic’ extremists, the two Indonesian Bali bombings rank very highly. I find it difficult to therefore accept Amirian’s argument here.

She talks about the millions of people forced to flee the fighting in the Swat valley. It is argued that this fighting is supposedly between the Pakistan army and the Pakistan Taliban; she states however that this is in fact a disguise: actually they are fleeing bombing by the Americans. Amirian needs a lesson in geography. Relatively speaking, the Swat valley is in the north, and the drone bombing attacks by the United States are on or near the Afghan border to the west.

Why is an Iranian political scientist, just like the Iranian foreign minister, using language that is full of errors, inconsistencies, and omissions? With Amirian I am of the view that she actually believes what she is talking about. With the foreign minister I am not no sure. In any case, the view presented is based on a deep running and blind assumption (a belief) that ‘the West’ is evil.

The hypocrisy is that Amirian argues that the essential intellectual problem is in the generalisation and therefore oversimplification of the concept of Islam. However the truth is that she has an erroneous view based on the generalisation and oversimplification of the concept of the West.

Just because a person can put words together to make a sentence does not make them sane. Amirian and the Iranian foreign minister both demonstrated seriously irrational mental thought processes. The more irrational a person becomes the more they approach being insane. Remember this that Hitler could string words together very nicely, and he was in fact either completely cuckoo or nefariously nuts.

High Stakes Poker

North Korea is an increasingly erratic pariah nation that is slowly but surely developing omni-potent weapons technologies. Also of serious concern is that technologies and materials may be fanned out across the globe to state or non-state actors that have ill intent. The difficult and tedious diplomatic efforts are testimony to the difficult road ahead. However it is almost surprising to note that North Korea’s path could easily have been considerable curbed or even terminated at any point over the last decades. Why then has this not happened? The answer is because the power to turn the taps off lies with the Chinese.

With supplies of aid, military trade, and other forms of trade, China has supported many dubious sovereign states. However North Korea’s recent advances in nuclear weapons technology give itself a little too much capability for China to feel comfortable with having such an erratic neighbourhood friend. Hence although it is unlikely that you will see any major policy shift from the Chinese, I would suggest that you will see the breaks being applied gradually over the next years. The same however cannot be said for China’s general policy of supporting brutal and reckless regimes.

Russia has followed suit behind China in propping up pariah states, but to a lesser degree. However I am of the opinion that the motivation is different to the Chinese. With the Chinese Communist Party, it is simply a criminal organisation that supports other criminal organisations. For Russia, I suggest that its poor conduct is more as an added counter-weight to its historical adversary – the United States of America. It is with this in mind that the high stakes poker game is being played out.

Barack Obama, the United States president, recently played a bold move. Just prior to his first official visit to Moskow, he threw his hope for a ‘restart’ in relations with President Medvedev, and openly slammed Premier Putin as an old crony with ‘one foot in the old and the other foot in the new’. Ever since Medvedev came to presidency pundits have incessantly posted the former president and current prime-minister Putin as being the real power. How would you think that this makes President Medvedev feel? Guaranteed Barack Obama does not agree with the pundits. Obama has alienated Putin to make Medvedev his chum. Whether or not this works remains to be seen, however he has at least achieved his initial objective.

There are numerous questions that remain as yet unanswered. Is Medvedev an autonomous presidential power, and if so, is he capable of improving relations with America? It is reasonable to assume that Putin has at least one foot in the old ‘cold-war’ mentality because in his eight years of reign relations have dive-bombed.

If relationships can improve between the two historic super-power enemies, then my prediction is that Russia will back away from its support for countries like North Korea and Iran. In this way China gets left out on its own, and with the increasing internal pressure (such as show in recent days in the major civil unrest with its Muslim minority), China will be in for a rough ride. Not only will it have difficulty maintaining its current ruinous strategy, it will also start to have pressure on its financial clout to back up this intent. Remember that Japan became a post World War II economic giant and everything you used to by was Japanese. Look at Japan now: a lost decade in a financial mire, and now collapsed exports and trade. Now everything you buy is made in China, but this is about to change. Following this logic, the next direction to look is either in Africa or in the countries where the industrial revolution started its first paradigmatic revolution. Such countries (America, Britain and Germany to name three) are now drowning in debt and are at the bottom of a cycle.

Now back to the poker game. In order to move relations forward with Russia, Obama backs Medvedev and gives Putin a good right hook – better remember that Putin is a spy guru with a martial arts forte. Anyway, the main point is that if relations with Russia improve, Russia will most likely withdraw or reduce support for regimes like North Korea and Iran. If this happens, its importance cannot be overstated. This may well shift the balance of power and bring about real change on issues that are getting more and more out of hand – as weapons technologies improve and potentially therefore proliferate.

So good luck to Mr Obama for he has already played his hand and Mr Medvedev is his new chum whilst Mr Putin is not at all a happy camper.

Intelligence Piracy

When you quote someone, as if to give further strength to a certain point of view, you are in effect deceiving yourselves first, and others second. The wise beings of the past have the vision to see far into the future and deep into the timeless. In quoting a wise being you are saying that you share the master’s vision with respect to some particular issue: you see what the master sees. You see as far as the master sees, and hence everybody better listen to you for your utterances are comprised of both clarity and importance.

There is a catch-22 when backing up your point of view with quotes from the sages. If you see as far as a sage then you are a learned one, and hence do not need to quote someone else. You alone stand tall and your words are ingrained with depth and truth. People will listen to your words, though perhaps in time distant from now. If you don’t see as far as a sage then you are unfortunately clueless as to the wisdom that the shell of words so contain. You are not up to the task of understanding wisdom and hence your parallels in apparent understanding are in fact mimicry. Make your own utterances, write your own truths, and live your own life.

Though lotus flowers and rose bushes are the envy of all, the desert wild flower shall dance vibrantly and wither not until its time has come to yield into the silence vast expanse of the endless undulating dunes.

It is true that beings who have attained yet are of less stature than a Buddha, a Jesus, or an Osho, point to these great beings as a means of reaching people who stand tall but shall fall far. If you were to meet a simple buddha who lives in a little hut by the way, and you had multiple university papers in hand, you shall laugh at the idiocy of the simple buddha. However the only thing that a sage knows is the same only thing that a simple buddha knows. The simple buddha is connected to the source, the very same source that has created the oral and written truths that inspire and uplift nations. The simple buddha knows that the sage’s beautiful message is still only a finger pointing to the moon; no problem in borrowing fingers if you are yourself the moon.

Rather than live your life according to another’s quotes, make your life a flowering worthy of being quoted.

Turmoil in Iran

There is a complicated web of problems with the power structure in Iran. I won’t here repeat or explain the structure but rather point to where its shortcomings lie.

The first problem is that the first Supreme Leader was indeed as the name suggests. Hence he set up a power structure that put himself numero uno. This meant that the legacy of the power structure is with the next supreme leader having a lot of power.

The second problem is that the central hub of the system – the Assembly of Experts – is comprised only of clerics. This means that there is a lack of input from various other intellectual fields to bring about balance in society.

The first two problems are almost intractable legacies of the religious revolution. These two problems can be addressed in time if the third problem is tackled.

The third problem is the vetting power giving to the Guardian Council. These ‘guardians’ have the power to exclude people from running in elections for parliament, president, and expert assembly.

It could be argued that the Iranian people democratically elect the supreme religious leader (via electing the assembly of experts, who inturn elect the supreme leader), a parliament, and a government. However the reason for democracy, just the same as the reason for limiting terms in office, is to reduce the corrupting force of holding positions of power. The problem is that by giving the guardian council the power to vet all candidates at the input side of the power structure, this council by default gets the power to hold themselves (and others) in office. They have the power to entrench themselves in power. In principal this is the fundamental power of (and reason for) democracy. The door is opened for the possibility of temptation.

The first time the Iranian political system operates (with the death of the first Ayatollah), all seems well. However on successive occasions, a feedback loop comes into play that restricts the functioning of the input side of the system. The people in power get more power and the Iranian people get less say. The end result is the possibility of a brutal dictatorial regime that on the surface looks democratic. This is what has happened in Iran.

Much effort in recent years has focused on reducing the vetting power of the Guardian Council. This council does not allow almost all opposing party members to run in elections, and certainly not a single woman is allowed to run for any office.

Today Iranian people are risking their lives - indeed giving their lives - in support of freedom and a better way of life. Brutality, corruption and inequality in the current system are revealing themselves through the benefits of modern communications technology. Indeed the current Supreme Leader yesterday sanctioned the bloodshed that today has eventuated. Yet the ugly face of religious hypocrisy is not hidden.

Meditation is Life

Meditation is life in its essence. Modern daily life is often described as a rat-race. Modernity unchecked can envelope our soul, consume our hearts, and spit out piles of rubbish: the tread-mill of hot-wired hearts in tension until suddenly our heart conks out or our brains blood vessels explode.

Modern psychology has transcended the idea of unconsciousness. There are indeed unconscious thoughts it takes hold. However to extend this description to the concept of unconsciousness itself being an entity is an erroneous transgression along the slippery slope of ill-informed sects, cults, and weirdos. Man is conscious: the defining characteristic that impales man on the cross of righteous domination of all that lies belittled below. This I have always found amusing, when we spend so much time asleep, and probably about the same time day-dreaming.

It is true that modern humanity functions at more than a sluggish level of consciousness. However it is not the quantity but rather the quality of this consciousness that it is strangely incumbent upon me to so clatter out on this electronic type-writer. Strange indeed you may or may not wonder – the explanation is that I am weary, yet all day an incessant nagging prods me to crunch these numbers. I shall do this and thus attain relief and sleep. Perhaps it is a looming volcanic vitriolic vestibule.

Notice what it is like when you are in a state of extreme stress. You may be achieving much in the limited slot of time. However what is this state of mania actually like? What is its quality? In this state it is essentially skimming across the surface of life. There is no depth to your experience; neither is there any understanding.

The ancient Buddhas speak of meditation as a tool for calm, and then insight. A consciousness that is tense is like a mirror; ever so prone to shattering is its brittle nature. There is no possibility of penetration, of depth. Techniques of concentration create a state of increased calm. In this state the experiencer tastes each experience in an increased fullness or depth. The calm awareness of a meditator leads to the quality of experiencing known as insight. A person who sees deeply through experiences knows the subtle nuances of life that are seemingly mysterious or unknown to the manic wave surfer.

There are always two sides to a two-sided coin. It happens to be that some people trudge through life like a dull sponge. In the list of sticky mucky smelly citizens are none other than those holy heroes of the great religious dogmas. The dogged dogmatic dodos are drowning in their own dull delusions. They save the immoral and condemn the amoral. They repeat well the scriptures that are ingrained on the mental rail-road of their predecessors and fore-fathers. There is nothing new or vibrant or insightful in their holy chants, nor in their dull eyes. Their conscious experience is like jumping on a trampoline made from a mat of boiled lettuce leaves, with jelly-fish for springs.

Yes the other side of the coin is a feasty gluttony of calm, with a malnourished consciousness. There can be nothing to challenge one’s spirit into aliveness if the path taken be the holiest of holy; except of course the ‘inconsequential’ transgressions of for example a boiling sexual repression.

Life is a quandary, not a quagmire nor a quip. With neither foggy eyes nor those wired by the drug of neediness, those who experience the richness of each moment, the fullness of each breath, are the few that are both sane and human. This is life, this is living, and this is meditation.

Concentration leads to calm, and calm leads to increased awareness and insight. How can a person return to an object of concentration if this person is not aware of a distraction?

How to Meditate?

What is meditation?
How do I meditate?

People tend to turn to meditation for relaxation and to de-stress. With this in mind, the principal meditation is that of concentration. Sometimes our minds may be going so helter-skelter that even a simple mental task seems daunting. In this case, taking our body out for some physical exercise, and then sitting down and reading a book out loud may help calm your mind.

When there is too much tension in the mind, it is not wise to try and tackle it head on. The issues may not be clear to you, but they will keep pushing themselves into your conscious mind. If you therefore concentrate on something that is not of high emotional value to you, then this seeks to block out the emotional noise that is creating tension.

If your mind runs to the stressful issue, which is presumably inevitable, turning you attention back to the chosen object of concentration reinforces the calming process. If the worrying issue is incessant, try ignoring it while still concentrating on the chosen focus. If this doesn’t work try something else. Even this trying is a concentration on trying and is therefore a help. Perhaps you might like to do some physically exercise rather than sitting like a buddha and watching your breath in some way (maybe on the rise and fall of belly). Is there something in the physical exercise that draws your attention and you enjoy focusing on it? Perhaps you just want to do something, and immerse yourself fully into it? Perhaps you just want to do something?

The idea of concentrating our attention for calm is like generating a powerful spotlight. Simply by turning our mind repeatedly to an object, the mind becomes stilled, and the awareness increases. With shades of grey, we reach a state where there is a sense of being very alert, yet relaxed or calm. Also, the mind is not excessively focused in a manic way on some issue. The mind is calm and quiet, and we have a relaxed awareness.

If you feel sufficiently calm and aware you might like to allow the spotlight to disperse its light in a spherical manner: opening your awareness to allow different aspects of the body-mind system to come and go freely in this expanded awareness.
After some time, and generally after it has already happened, you may realize that this state of relaxed and open awareness with mental and physically events passing untouched through it has given way to tension and particular mental or physical events pressing repeatedly on your consciousness. If you feel uncomfortable you may then like to make the consciousness choice to return to concentrating on a emotionally neutral object.

Meditation is the rhythm of moving back and forwards from a state of focused attention to a state of relaxed and open awareness. It is about being here-now, while choosing what to be here-now with. Sometimes the here-now is a little overwhelming. In this case choose a friend to be here-now with. If that is overwhelming just give-up and go with the flow. What ever you do and don’t do, you are in the here and now. This is reality. If you can’t find the truth, the truth will come and find you. It will set you free.

Meditation can seem confusing, and here are two areas that may prove to be a puzzle.

Firstly, sometimes we feel calm yet we are not particularly aware – something like day-dreaming. In this case you may find that if you decide to concentrate on something you can’t. Actually by doing so, this increases the awareness and brings us to an issue that we may have been avoiding by dulling our awareness (going to sleep to avoid a problem for example).

The second puzzle is that of what is the difference between concentration, attention, mind, and awareness. When it is said turn your attention towards something, is that the same as turning your mind towards it? Is this different to someone saying concentration on something? How does this fit with someone saying turn your awareness towards some object?

The confusion becomes cleared up by understanding that if you turn your mind towards something (lets say you chant a holy scripture), this concentrating your mind also concentrates your awareness. You become aware of what your mind is concentrating on. You become aware of the process of chanting, the sound of your voice, the way it makes your body feel, the way your mouth moves to create sound etc.

A person might say they feel so crazy they can’t seat down and read a complicated book. If they still want to read, they may be able to read a simple book. This focusing or concentrating the mind also focuses or concentrates the awareness. The result is an increase in relaxation or calm.

A person might feel so cuckoo that they can’t do their normal task of fixing rocket engines. If such a person is on mental sick-leave, such a person may be able to enjoy fixing car engines. This concentrating the body on a particular task also focuses or concentrates the awareness. The result is an increase in relaxation or calm.

How to Lose Weight

Weight Loss

How to lose weight: the essential focus is on the simple fact that humans are animals who require food and water for nourishment and survival. We do get hungry, and there is a feeling in our stomach when we get very hungry.

The other part of the approach is that we all have a natural weight, and this may mean that we are like a stick-insect or a circus tent.

Food is an obsession in the mind that covers up the basic truths that we are not all ‘thin’, and that food is a natural and healthy biological function.

Firstly, take time throughout the day to take general notice of how much you worry about food – how much you think that you are eating too much, and how guilty emotional and thought patterns repeat themselves afterwards.

When you have a sense of this pattern, also bring awareness to how your stomach feels at different times throughout the day. Along with this, are there any basic patterns that emerge: when is it for example that you are really hungry; what is it like to feel hungry; and what is it like to feel that you are very low on energy because of a lack of food?

Are there times throughout the day when you feel so hungry that this hunger would fit nicely with a main meal. How many times throughout the day does this occur (two or three for example)? How many times throughout the day do you feel that a snack will be the natural order? Please note that this process of identifying your natural rhythm will refine as you bring awareness and (possibly) changes to the way you eat. Also perhaps your rhythm changes throughout the years and with the seasons. In other words the emphasis is on a balance of flexibility and regime, couple with increased awareness.

The idea of bringing awareness to the process is a natural one. If you spend a lot of time worrying about food, your weight, and your image, then would it be worthwhile making a decision to have a good objective look at what is going on – if you are the type, maybe keep a log throughout the day, and over a period of some days, detailing your different emotional states, level of cravings for food, and what you eat (perhaps just one of these elements is your key). You may like to give a particular factor a rating (say from 1 to 10).

With a more objective look at food in your life, you can than make conscious decisions about what changes you would like to make, if any, to the way you approach food. Be prepared throughout the process for general ideas and fresh insights to flow. If you make any startling findings, see how they can become a practical force. Experiment with what you eat and when you eat, and find out what works for you. If you think you have found your golden key to conquering obsessions with food and weight, be prepared for this to change (even if subtly).

In the end you may find that you simply eat when you eat because you are hungry, and that you simply eat what you eat because you like it. This leads you to being the shape you are and this is your natural shape. It is part of your nature and it is the outward expression of your natural beauty. So even if nothing changes physically, to drop all the worry and to accept your natural body shape can bring about tremendous change in you well being.

If you lose weight that may well be great. However the key is to realize that we eat because we are hungry. Also, our body naturally knows the right things to eat and in what quantities if we develop the sensitivity. Ultimately, becoming more aware of the process can give us the distance to see our patterns, even if we feel they are wrong and for now we are not capable of changing these entrenched patterns. This keen observation can also in time create the understanding to slowly bring about change in our physical habits, and send our emotional patterns on a healthy turn towards healing.

Sri Lankan Crisis

If there was ever a clear indication that the future of the new world risks either a world war or destruction of the planet, it was in the majority vote handed down by the United Nations human rights council.

We have emerging and emerged powers and super-powers coming out of the developing world that will create a new global landscape in the 21st century. A combination of these new players secured a majority vote to not only reject a call for an independent investigation into the final stages of the Sri Lankan civil war, but also to endorse a resolution praising the Sri Lankan government.

I am not here taking a position against the Sri Lankan government. The simple fact of the matter is that the truth of the situation is not known, and further that there is a reasonable possibility of civilian deaths on a massive scale, and of serious crimes by both the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil Tiger rebels.

The United Nations was the only independent authority to have collected information (not only anecdotal, but also satellite imagery of craters emerging in civilian safe zones) to get closest to the truth. The United Nations accepts that it does not have sufficient evidence to draw conclusions, but has made it clear that there are sufficient grounds for an investigation. In fact the news accounts that have managed to flow out from the war-zone makes a prima facie case for investigation obvious to any rational person.

How is it then that delegates from a majority of countries managed to conclude that there was no case to answer to (from either side), and that situation was an internal matter? As I said previously, the United Nations had much more information than any other independent organisation. On what grounds did delegates reach their conclusions? Where did they get there factual information as a basis for their decisions?

Adolf Hitler, perhaps the world’s worst known tyrant, was elected into power by the people. The UN Human Rights Council operates under basic democratic principals, and concluded against the evidence. To be sure, the evidence was not sufficient to draw concrete conclusions, but it was certainly sufficient to necessarily warrant investigation into the possibility of serious humanitarian and war crimes.

Conceive if you will a scenario where planet Earth has a democratically elected global government. The democratic vote of the UN HRC is testimony to the logical possibility of this planet being headed by an oppressive and criminal government. If you think I am crazy, consider a super-power like China. China has of course its own internal matter of Tibet, not to mention the Tiananmen Square atrocity, its allies in Burma and Sudan - and the list goes on. The negative influence throughout the world of China’s totalitarian political party is significant, and may therefore continue to do so. If China continues to grow as a super-power, and continues to be run as a dictatorship, it is not very difficult to imagine very grave scenarios some decades down the road - whereby a majority of oppressive states create a scary new world.

A little note here on torture. Sure some of the so-called enhanced interrogation methods used by the United States have occupied the grey area between right and wrong. However even the slightest reading into the torture methods used by the Chinese against the Tibetans leaves no shades of grey for quandary. The level of interrogation used by the United States against indeed the shadiest of characters cannot be compared with state sponsored torture that has occurred in recent times in innumerable countries.

The majority ruling of the UN HRC was indeed a watershed moment in the divining of future global possibilities. It is the clearest warning yet to Western powers such as the United States and various countries in the European Union that they indeed need to take defence and national security as a fundamental necessity for the foreseeable long-term future. A few decades from now, the idea of lending a hand to oppressed minorities in other parts of the world may give way to national defence and national allegiances.

That there is a reasonable possibility of civilian Tamil deaths in Sri Lanka to the level of not just thousands, but tens of thousands in the last weeks and months of battle, and that that goes unquestioned by the international community leaves me with a feeling of utter disgust. I am sure that many countries that voted in accord with the head of the United Nations and the chief of the UN HRC, will indeed take very serious note of the very grave outcome.

The outcome, just like democratically elected Hitler, Hamas, and the new Israeli government, is democracy at its worst. Democracy is a principal that offers hope for a humanity that has since the dawn of time fought against the will to power of tyrants. Democracy is however a principal conditioned by the principal that the majority of civilians are in fact civil: are in fact sane. The barbarian in man has yet to emerge fully from the jungle. The tiger may well be in the Tamil militant group. However it is lurking live and well in other places as well. May this planet prosper and not be consumed by darkness.

Crime and Punishment

That which you do unto others shall be done unto you.

Are you sure who you are, where you have been, and where you are onwards journeying? Who is? Indeed what is onwards, what is now, and what is backwards? Are you sure that your memories are indeed yours? Are you sure that you have even lived this life, let alone a past one?

What if you had dreams or nightmares or visions or intuitions about past lives, and they turned out to be the unlived energetic memories of other people who are living now or have lived in the recent past?

Often people who experience deep trauma go through a period of being in shock, and then have significant gaps in their recollection of the trauma. Just maybe the experience is stored somewhere in the universe, as a compressed energetic experience.

It would be reasonable to assume that initially the trauma is stored in the persons unconscious. However what if the traumatic event never gets recalled, and the person eventually recovers from the trauma (a happy war veteran for example). A believer in past-lives is a believer in future lives. Hence the happy war veteran has some karma to process through a future life in a higher state of penetrating consciousness. However what if there is a collective unconscious – a kind of storehouse for all of humanities nasty stuff. Now in this case when a major life event is buried deep enough, it may (probably at the time of death) merge into a collective quagmire of humanities negative energies.

Conceive if you so choose an event say of someone being raped, tortured, or murdered. Although such a person may in some way attract a negative event - let’s say a person with deep hidden rage attracts a murderer - I would argue that the victim is still not necessarily receiving karmic justice. Further, there are many instances of deep tragedies in this world where innocent victims are in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Now imagine that a person recovers as best they can from a traumatic event, but still their memory of the incident did not get retrieved. The energetic experience is one of peak human potential. What I mean by this is that during momentous life-changing events people often tap into enormous energy reserves: for example in fighting off or running away from an attacker. This compressed, stored energy one day has to see the light of day.

How is it that mystics say that karma is inescapable? Every negative action will attract a negative consequence; conveniently the reverse is also true. One theory is that when a tyrant of a being is available for learning, and has sufficient consciousness to not in general act on the tyrannical desires, the following occurs.

A stored event in the collective unconsciousness becomes tuned with the tyrant, at the very instant that the tyrant has the negative desire revealed. The stored event (a victim’s painful experience) becomes implanted in the tyrants psyche. It is a perfect meeting of polarised energies; a perfect magnetic fatal attraction.

Karma seems to carry itself out in a vague way in this world, with seemingly innocent victims meeting misfortune in an unfair world. However at a deeper level it just might be that karma is entirely perfect, and entirely inescapable. Also, in this way, if an innocent person can grow from a horrific event, then this journey can in some way be said to be immensely beneficial. Whatever part of the horrific event cannot be consciously witnessed, consciously relived, and ultimately let go of (or dropped), will one day be attracted to either its creator, or a person who has committed a criminal and unethical act of the same type and magnitude.

In this way, at a deeper level, the workings of the universe are perfect. The sentence always fits the crime because the perpetrator one day inescapably adopts the worst part of a victim’s experience, and then has to relive this experience. In this way the tyrant finds out exactly what it is like to be the victim, and in this way those of thick skin learn, and also in this way burn down the storehouse of collective ‘live’ latent energetic memories.

How to act in a complicated world? The wise say that right conduct is not an exploit of intellectual analysis; rather it is conduct that grows in the womb of an accelerating awareness.

The wise say that there are not just two levels of unconsciousness, but three. The third level may be referred to as cosmic unconsciousness. In Christianity it is known as Hell!

That which you do unto others shall be done unto you.

From my experience I firmly believe the above to be true, though not for sure.

China and The Taliban

It is often difficult to discern the truth when the concerned parties hold opposing points of view. Who is right and who is wrong on the latest conflict in the Israeli versus Palestine saga? Israel had reason to take action against the increasing threat of rocket attacks from Gaza. The civilian toll in Gaza seems to be excessive, even after discounting the acknowledged unfortunate (but apparently inevitable: due to Hamas militant operational protocols) errors.

Personally after viewing the situation from afar for a couple of years my opinion is that Israel is in general guilty of aggression. Democracy elected Hamas a couple of years back. Politics pressured them (and rightfully so I would argue) into boiling over and taking over Gaza (at the expense of the West Bank). Now democracy has elected a right-wing government in Israel, and the new foreign minister shows signs of rhetoric leaning towards the current Iranian president Armadinejad’s warped nuances.

Admittedly here it should be pointed out that Armedinejad was condemned without trial for his latest outburst at a United Nations convention against racism. This lack of trial is itself the essential hidden quality of a racist.

In my interpretation of what Armadinejad said, the key launching pad for his tirade against Israel was the military aggression of the newly formed post World War II Israeli state. My reading of the historical situation is clear and uncomplicated. The colonial powers in the region (primarily Britain) gave a growing movement of Jews a sovereign state. Shortly afterwards Israel launched a military campaign that took by force more land from the Palestinian people. Invasion of another country to appropriate its lands is many things, not least of all racist.

However personally I think Armadinejad shows significant aberration of thought processes, and is therefore not just a little neurotic, but actually quiet clearly insane. Though this is perhaps not the most preferential quality of an Iranian president, the final factor in the equation is something very little discussed. Israel has a significant stockpile of nuclear weapons. This issue needs to be dealt with if there is any hope of achieving peace in the Middle-East.

I congratulate George Bush (junior) for at least one thing – being the expounder of the phrase Axis of Evil. (Oh and also for being the first Western power to take a stand on Tibet…really this is a remarkable feat and should never be forgotten.) North Korea and Iran represent serious present and future concern. However I take aim at this focus, and the sidewards focus on Russia. The situation with Chinese spying and financial investments in key strategic foreign interests has been disputed as being the ancient mythological yellow-peril syndrome. However what about the fact that the key financial backer for the Burmese military junta and the Sudanese government is China. Ask the millions of people that have either been raped, tortured, or slaughtered at the hands of brutal state actors propped up by the Chinese Communist Party.

Since we are looking at brutal military regimes what about the situation in Fiji? Fiji’s military leader took control of the country in a bloodless coup in 2006. The situation in Fiji has been declining ever since. The military leader appoints a president who appoints the military leader as the prime-minister. The media is controlled like a vice and all court documents relating the coup have been shredded. As foreign powers are trying to assert pressure to bring back democracy and the rule of law, the upper echelons of the Chinese Communist Party have been cultivating closer financial and personal ties with the self-appointed leaders of a military dictatorship. The Chinese government forges ties with the oppressive evil of this world.

To call the Dalai Lama evil is an absurdity that is evident to all the major powers of the world. The French president Sarkozy knew this when he went against Chinese pressure and met the Dalai Lama. Unfortunately at the latest G-20 meeting the Western powers needed some of China’s plundered wealth, and hence an intimate encounter between the French and Chinese heads of state finished with Nicolas Sarkozy stating that very clearly Tibet was a part of China. The proposition that the invasion of Tibet, the slaughter of its people and its culture and religion, was an act of surf liberation is in the realms of the seriously delusional. A reading of the Tibetan society shows that it had harshness and beauty that paralleled its natural rugged surrounds. However as a society it was not one that oppressed and tortured its people to maintain power. A look at the democratic changes in a near neighbour (Bhutan, not to mention India) shows that Tibet also was a country that could also change for the better through internal reform, not Chinese annihilation.

So to those who say that the yellow-peril is an ancient myth I say to them just for a day step in the place of a person from Darfur, Burma, or Tibet. Why not spend tomorrow in fear of the Junjaweed; or how about hanging out getting tortured in a Burmese or Tibetan jail? Tomorrow there will be thousands of people languishing in severe torment through outrageous acts of violence against innocent victims at the hands of those who have life through the Chinese government.

While I am on the subject of brutality, what about the Taliban? All those great moral processions of protestors that oppose action against the Taliban are uninformed of the roots of their mis-virtue. To act in the name of good out of emotion rather than understanding is the very crime of the Taliban. The situation in the north-west of Pakistan makes this evident. Many people view this war (as with the war in Iraq) as a war of America versus Islam, or the West versus Allah. Aside from the virtue of toppling Saddam Hussein, the war in Iraq was primarily one between radical elements of different Islamic religious factions – even today it is the case (car bombs still killing people by the hundreds).

The north-west of Pakistan is home to semi-autonomous regions. In small pockets of mountainous terrain tribes, tribal chiefs, and socio-cultural traditions are the foundation of a unique way of life. The Taliban move into these tribal regions, kill or abduct the tribal chiefs, slaughter any adhoc tribal army that tries to prevent their presence, and then introduces a brutal rule of law that is somehow in tune with God. After the government of Pakistan gave the Taliban and its affiliates the Swat Valley as there playground – in exchange for peace – shortly afterwards groups of militants with high-powered weapons started taking over a region immediately to the south (a region home to many hundreds of thousands of people). They have come to within 100 kilometres of the Pakistan capital Islamabad. The key point here is that in their movements they simply take over by force an already existing functioning civil society. They do this via abduction, murder, and essentially, fear. The Taliban oppress its own people through military force. As with Iraq, the war in Afghanistan, and the warring in Pakistan, is internal in nature. It is Islam versus Allah, or Allah versus Islam. Actually it is the creative against the destructive, good versus evil, God or Allah versus all that is ugly in humanity.

I note here that the Taliban refers to the umbrella of violent, radical elements, and so does not refer to authentic religious people who call themselves Taliban. The same to is for the term China. China’s general population lives at the whim and oftentimes mercy of its one-party political machine. It is not just the Burmese dissidents, the Tibetan people, or Darfurians that suffer; it is also all the Chinese human rights activists, the deceased Tiananment Square visionaries, the Chinese children that died in poorly built schools, the hundreds of thousands of Chinese babies sickened (and worse) by tainted milk, and the world over that consumes poor quality fast-food and other fast-products.

In my opinion China needs a new religiousness. Buddhism is a religion with deep roots in China, not Christianity. Its people need a new flowering of the ancient buddhist religion to feed its starving soul.

News Story 26 Feb 09

News is often bad so may as well start with the bad news for the day. If luck has its way there will then be room for some good news.

The bad news is that the current Chinese presidents greatest achievement to date (other than for his efforts being promoted to president) is that he was governor of the Tibetan region during the brutal crushing of the second Tibetan uprising.

The good news – see I had a feeling there would be some good news forthcoming – is that Australia will soon no longer manufacture any clothing, and hence if Australia goes to war with China they will have to fight naked. No problem in that I should think, at least we can drive our cars around until they run out of fuel from the Middle East.
Interesting news is that the most pressure applied to a bridge comes not from a convoy of fully laden trucks driving over them, but from a tightly packed bunch of marathon fun-runners pounding their way across it.

Of relevant news – you may well be wondering – applies to the (osho) International Meditation Resort in Pune, India – a resort that claims to have over 100, 000 visitors annually. In particular I refer here to its new almighty, award winning, towering, monolithic, pyramid-like meditation auditorium.

The news is that this building has had cement failure, and a neighbouring building (constructed as part of the same project) has had failings due to mixing down of cement (not using enough cement in the concrete mixture).

The interesting question is what happens to the brickwork, structural steel, cement, welds, and bolts, when the devoted Osho sannyassins pound the floor of the Auditorium during their controversially active morning Dynamic meditation?

Of course it hardly seems worth mentioning that for years people drank contaminated drinking water at this so-called spiritual oasis.

To tie things up neatly, I wonder how many Chinese children died in schools that collapsed during last years horrific earthquake disaster due to atrocious and incomprehensible workmanship?

For the second string on the wrapping, the parallel between Chinese food contamination scandals and contamination of drinking water at the resort is also interesting.

You probably would not be surprised to learn that for my efforts to expose the truth I have been banned from this (osho) resort; I have been threatened in writing; I have been verbally threatened; I have been threatened with being punched, have been pushed, and have been punched; I have been threatened with metal rods and sticks; and I have (probably) been threatened with a knife.

I almost forgot about a sweet little anecdote. A brick-layer came to the resort to do some work-as-meditation. He was put to work supervising labours doing construction projects. The summary of the scenario was that the workers thought that he would obviously not know anything about construction work, and so they could pull the wool over his eyes (so to speak). He was of the opinion that they were trying to steal cement. What they did was overstate the amount of cement needed and used for any particular job. Now a supervisor who has no idea of construction would not have a clue how much cement is needed for a job. However this person happened to be a brick-layer by trade.

I don't recall the exact details: whether they were stock-piling cement on the side or whether at the end of the job it appeared that all the cement was used, yet could not possibly have been: someone who knows about such things would be able to look at the colour of the concrete to see how much cement is used in the concrete mixture. The likely scenario put forward to me was that over-quoting and supposedly using this excessive amount meant that the labourers were free to steal a certain amount of valuable cement.

Now if someone wanted to investigate the quality of cement work on a project they could easily look at the amount of cement used, and draw conclusions accordingly. However in this case the conclusions would be wrong.

So what about the mixing down of cement that I identified on the project that included the grand meditation pyramid? One possibility is that the correct amount of cement was quoted, with lesser cement used, and some of the valuable product strangely disappearing – perhaps into nirvanna?

While I am on the subject, one last little twig. Trees and branches have historically been neglected, and a high-tension cabling system winds trees up into a dangerous state of tension.
It has been some time since my last un-meditative visit to the resort, and I assume that deep meditation in the still-standing auditorium has channelled wisdom and compassion into the supposedly spiritual management.

As far as the Chinese communist party is concerned, the latest US state department survey has noted last years brutal crushing of Tibetans for the third time, and also an increase in the level of human rights abuses generally.

The contents of this article reflect the opinion of the author only. Some of the contents may appear factual, but are conclusions. The author shall not be held liable for any of the articles contents.

Also, the author is not a civil engineer, but is an engineer with practical civil experience.

Finally, it should be noted that the author worked with engineers and consulting microbiologist at the resort, and is a qualified engineer.