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.

Soft Wind

Love shall not come from you
in your time of need.

You who shall for now not sing
thy song of dreams so sweet,
will in time be folded into
the dawn of timeless wonder.

Fear not your journey my friend;
fear not your dreams nor your foe.

Timeless is your night-time.
Endless shall be thy dance.

Why in times gone past?
Questions raised with no answers.
Indeed movement sways the weary.

Untold shall be sung.
Forever is not your time.

You are here as the source of all.
Can you not here the rhythm?
Can you not smell the sweet wine?

So many journeys unfold
in a criss-cross of tumbling twine.
Unfolding yields not to those
who puzzle over it.

Forgive me once and
in time we shall proceed.
Forgive me twice and
I have erred again.
Shall I learn in time
thy song from on high.

Is it not silence that speaks
through the highest winds.
Shall I rest tonight, unyielding
to the forces of peril.

Sleep with me and
we shall arise anew.

The old is reborn and
the days are clean.

Sing yea to the unborn.
Sing yea the unsung.

We shall listen and
many shall dance.

Joy comes to the joyous.

Sheep follow the shepherd
into the shearers shed.

Magic shall not come to me
if I remain unseen.

Majesty stands tall
in an empty sky.

Passing clouds pass by.

This is all there is.

This is all.

Sweetness shall touch the sensitive:
those who dare to search the soft winds.

Cloudless mist passing
without the winds of time.

Good may your journey be;
good may be your night be;
good may you be.

You be already that which you are.
You be not your dreams of passion.
You the passing trees on the highway.

Can you not ask me why?
Will I not answer yes?

Trees are passing shades of life;
flowers are passing shades of colour.

That which sees the passing
shall dance forever:
enduring beyond the
veil of dreams.

Who are you my beloved friend?
From whence you have arrived?
To hence shall you go?

I am where I am.
That is where I have come from.
That is where I shall go.

Comings and goings are like waves.
I come and go, yet endlessly I arrive.
I am arriving yet I am already here.
I have gone yet I am still here.
Can you not see me?

I can see you.
In fact I can
see your dreams.
In fact I am you.
Fear not though,
for you am I.

Together shall be this journey of ours.
Lonely shall the alone not be;
it is nigh on impossible my beloved.

Ancient scrolls yield not to your deceptions.
The truth in words is a door.
The doorway is amongst the words,
hidden between the lines.

I pass by you as you pass by me.
I am unseen to those who look away.
I am seen to those who open their hearts.

That which you have done wrong
may in fact be a misunderstanding.
Pass by again when the mind is calm
and your awareness is clear.
You may be surprised.

The answers are hidden;
the dreams are many.

The truth is the unsurpassed.

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.

Story 25 Feb 09

Unfortunately I have a bad memory and today could not be bothered looking up what I wrote yesterday. So if the story doesn't fit do not be surprised.

It was unfortunate that Alan Greenspan (the last chairmen of the US federal-reserve), a free-market ideologue, was forced to go through an identity crisis by the American financial meltdown. I shall restrain myself and not mention here anything of the recently departed president Bush.

What is also interesting is comments I heard last night on the radio that denounced the concept of welfare. It was said that to share is to divide, and to grow is to share. To be forced in any way to give your wealth that you have worked so hard for to those who couldn't be bothered getting off their asses and doing something, is an outrageous indignity. Furthermore, it eats away at the free spirit of man and makes him feel like doing nothing at all.

Accepted that the person presenting this argument will not go easily into the category he is so despising. However with such a narrow-minded point of view, one day I wouldn't be surprised if he developed a mind-splitting mental illness. In which case, the character may be unable to work, and probably his stupidity would have meant he had very little savings to rely on. I would argue that there should be the notion of state support, however not for the person in question.

Accepting the obvious merit of his argument, the categories of people in financial hardship is vast. No doubt so many people really do need support in some way for some length of time. Obviously there needs to be a balance. It is good to discourage the quality of laziness that is often so tempting and ruinous of creativity and zest for life. However just the same it is not good to encourage the kind of blind financial obsession that has led to housing-stress, financial crisis, economic crisis, human depression, and possibility economic depression – with hence the possibility of further human depression. It should be noted here that I am not just talking about America. There are many other countries with similar issues, and many more that may follow suit.

However, taking me back to US financial gurus, on the radio this morning the current US federal reserve chairmen said that if all the stabilising and kick-starting measures actually work, then things will get better soon. However if they don't work, then guess what, things won't be getting better soon. Wow, thanks guru Ben, I don't suppose that president Obama was planning for his plans not to work!!!

That concludes the story for today.

Tomorrows Story 24 Feb 09

What an interesting day indeed it is. I was very much troubled when I read yesterday's story, and considered the potential implications. However in this moment my mind is at ease. You see a miracle happened to me. I had the pleasure of being saved by Benny Hinndrance. Bless me and lord shower angels and confetti all across my way, for all my physical ailments have evaporated, I know longer have a housing crisis, and I gave all my money to his blessed crusading and cronies. Ah yes what be it me to be troubled with this world when I can enjoy being hypnotised by Benny Hinndrance.

Meanwhile Wayward Wally was deep in contemplation devising a most devilishly cunning plan, as cunning as a fox who is professor of cunning at Foxford University. However he came upon two significant problems.

Firstly Wally was concerned about the dark word democracy. The very word had sinister undertones, and even uttering out-loud left Wally feeling deeply drained. He had seen with his own eyes the effects of this word in countries struggling to climb out of war. When elections are called in any particular region or country, abductions, torture, murder, and violence in general, escalates. This was proof to Wally that democracy had to be a bad thing.

The other issue troubling Wally is quite surprisingly relating to none other than Benny Hinndrance. Wally new full well that Benny Hinndrance was lost in a delusional, grandiose state of communion with the the big cheese. Therefore he knew that that Benny was nothing more than tasty sweets to little sleepy children. The trouble was however that his sweets were so yummy, and all the kiddies were very very hungry. Indeed this was the hunger that Wally himself was wanting to feed.

Admittedly Benny had stumbled on a few little secrets. Firstly he has the capacity to hypnotise people who are almost asleep. Secondly, if people have psychosomatic issues - even say a physical ailment that has healed, yet the person still believes they have a problem - then Benny can wave his magic bible and hallelujah a miracle has happened. Benny really believes in his own delusion, and he knows what people deeply need – love; compassion; and trust.

Wally was perplexed because to him it seemed that there was little difference between Benny and his cronies, and preachers who profess violence in the name of the Moslem religion. Both flock seem blind and easily lead. The only difference appeared to be that the message was vastly different. Benny really did say the nicest things. He actually means well, and can actually help. So it seemed a little strange to Wayward Wally. Hence he decided to go and see his guru, Adwarf Hateler.

Adwarf was as usual full of sparkling revulsion. However he remained silent for a while pondering the puzzle.