Freedom Lawyers of America

U.S. rates only 17th in global survey of press freedoms
CNS
An international survey on press freedom has triggered
criticism and concern among journalists and First
Amendment advocates in the U.S. who say flawed methodology led
to the country's 17th-place ranking. (10/30/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/841440218.html

Anarchism.net
by Per Bylund
"Laissez Faire is not about privatizing the State. It is about
abolishing the state, REPLACING it with market means and
instruments for justice and protection. This may seem like the
same thing, but it is not. Privatizing the State would mean
keeping the structures, institutions and functions of the
State." (10/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/466180526.html

US Court Protects Doctors Who Recommend Marijuana
Tue Oct 29, 5:49 PM ET
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Doctors who recommend medical marijuana to
sick patients cannot be stripped of their licenses to prescribe drugs
even though marijuana is banned by federal law, a federal appeals
court ruled on Tuesday.

In a decision hailed as a breakthrough by medical marijuana
advocates, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court
ruling which protects the constitutional right of doctors to
recommend medical marijuana.
"An integral component of the practice of medicine is the
communication between a doctor and a patient," the appeals court's
three-judge panel said in its unanimous ruling.
"Being a member of a regulated profession does not, as the government
suggests, result in a surrender of First Amendment rights."
Federal officials have maintained a tough line against medical
marijuana, taking action against medical marijuana providers even
though nine states, including California, permit medical use of the
drug under state law.
After lengthy litigation, the U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites)
ruled last year that clubs formed to provide marijuana to sick
patients were breaking federal law, and law enforcement officials
have gone after several such groups in recent months.
The 9th Circuit, which disagreed with the Supreme Court on the
viability of California's medical marijuana law, said on Tuesday that
doctors who "recommend" -- rather than formally prescribe -- medical
marijuana were simply exercising their free speech rights and should
not be punished.
"The record is replete with examples of doctors who claim a right to
explain the medical benefits of marijuana to patients and whose
exercise of that right has been chilled by the threat of federal
investigation," the court said.
The court further rejected the government's assertion that, by
recommending medical marijuana, doctors were inviting their patients
to break the law, noting that there are legal ways patients might
seek marijuana, such as through a government-approved research
project or attempting to persuade the federal government to change
the marijuana laws.
Medical marijuana advocates, who say the drug can help patients who
are suffering nausea from chemotherapy, appetite loss from AIDS
(news - web sites) or chronic pain from multiple sclerosis, said the
decision was a major victory.
"Today's ruling is a major victory for patients and doctors," Gina
Palencar, policy director of Americans for Medical Rights, said in a
statement.
"With physician-patient communications protected, patients in nine
states can assert their rights to use marijuana as medicine."

Vice Fund will not repent for investing in so-called sins
----------
Washington Times
The Vice Fund, a new mutual fund, aims to capitalize on the
permanence of people's taste for pleasure by investing
heavily in "sin" stocks from four industries: alcohol,
tobacco, gambling and defense. (10/29/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/954481723.html

Search Engine News from Around the Web

Inktomi Expands Amazon Deal
http://siliconvalley.internet.com/news/article.php/1486081

Google Excludes Controversial Sites
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2124386,00.html

LookSmart Looks Lively
http://www.themercury.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,5361926%255E462,00.html

It�s Goodbye Free AltaVista Email, Hello Pure Search Site
http://www.revolutionmagazine.com/comment/view.cfm?r=1&id=94604

**In 1911, Turkey established gun control. From 1915 to
1917, 1.5 million Armenians, unable to defend
themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
**In 1929, the Soviet Union established gun control.
From 1929 to 1953, about 20 million dissidents, unable
to defend themselves, were rounded up and
exterminated.
**China established gun control in 1935. From 1948 to
1952, 20 million political dissidents, unable to
defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
**Germany established gun control in 1938 and from 1939
to 1945, 13 million Jews and others who were unable to
defend themselves were rounded up and exterminated.
**Cambodia established gun control in 1956. From 1975
to 1977, one million 'educated' people, unable to
defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
**Guatemala established gun control in 1964. From 1964
to 1981, 100,000 Mayan Indians, unable to defend
themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
**Uganda established gun control in 1970. From 1971 to
1979, 300,000 Christians, unable to defend themselves,
were rounded up and exterminated.

Defenseless people rounded up and exterminated in the
20th Century because of gun control: 56 million.

by Don Doig
Curriden goes on to cite a study by The Dallas Morning News and the
Sourthern Methodist University Law Review which "identified more than 700
cases since 1990 in which jurors stated publicly that they intended their
verdicts to have impact beyond their individual cases. Between 1970 and
1990 the study found fewer than 100 such cases. In the 70 years prior,
researchers identified only 17 cases in which jurors indicated they wanted
their verdicts to have some kind of broader influence." Many of these were
civil cases.
"But the practice is even more widespread today [than in the time of the
Penn and Zenger trials]. For example, jurors in Atlanta in the mid-1990's
started acquitting sports bookmaking defendants on a regular basis, even
though such cases were usually slam dunks. In post-trial interviews, jurors
saId they saw no moral difference between sports betting and playing the
Georgia lottery.
"In Dallas, jurors started digging in their heels in 1999 in cases
involving lewd dancing.... The jury in one case publicly criticized police
for wasting taxpayers' money investigating and prosecuting what amounted to
victimless crimes. The jurors' statements made news and soon other juries
in similar cases were refusing to convict."
"'Now, when a dancer decides to fight these cases to a jury, they almost
always win,' says Houston lawyer Mike Maness. 'It's absolutely a case of
jurors telling police this is not appropriate public policy.'"
"Tom Charron, director of the National District Attorneys Advocacy Center,
says jury nullification isn't always bad. He says there are thousands of
outdated laws still on the books that could and might still be prosecuted
were it not for the willingness of jurors to refuse to convict."
An article from the Modesto Bee, March 17, 2002 by Ty Phillips notes that
since the passage of the medical marijuana initiative in 1996, "it has
become increasingly difficult for prosecutors to convince juries to convict
[in] medical marijuana cases." Prosecutors are deciding not to file charges
in many cases. Describing a hung jury, Phillips says: "That is how most
every medical marijuana case in Stanislaus county has ended during the past
five years" [with just one exception].
"Last April, a Sonoma County jury found two men innocent of cultivation and
possession charges after police arrested them for growing 899 marijuana
plants. The men claimed that they were growing the plants for a San
Francisco medical marijuana club."
A recent poll (AP article, Bozeman Daily Chronicle, 10/24/98) said: "Most
Americans eligible to serve on a jury say they would act on their own
beliefs of right and wrong regardless of legal instructions from a judge, a
poll says. Three out of four potential jurors agreed with the statement:
'Whatever a judge says the law is, jurors should do what they believe is
the right thing.'" Of course, the effective percentage would drop once they
are subjected to intimidation from the judge.
As the impact of informed juries grows, the legal establishment reacts with
more and more draconian abridgments of trial by jury, exemplified by the
People v. Williams case in California and U.S. v. Thomas from the federal
Second Circuit Court of Appeals. In both cases the court ruled that sitting
jurors can be removed if the judge learns that a juror is refusing to
enforce the law. This declares that openly expressed jury nullification is
grounds for removal from the jury. Tyrannical as this is, conscientious
jurors are left with a clear alternative strategy, and that is to raise the
bar on reasonable doubt; to latch on to anything in the evidence, the
character and motives and reliability of the witnesses or the police, and
hold fast to your reasonable doubts. Judges have not yet usurped the power
to remove you from the jury for these kind of reasons. As long as you bring
up the question of evidence, you call still talk in terms of justice,
conscience, and equity.
Federal judges have, however found ways to deny you a jury trial
altogether. They declare that despite the Sixth Amendment guarantee of a
jury trial "in all criminal prosecutions", you don't get a jury trial if
the sentence is for less than six months, and then they multiply six month
charges, which are to be served consecutively, with still no jury trial.
Additionally, federal judges have decided it is acceptable to "enhance" a
sentence for "relevant conduct" for which a defendant has been acquitted.
To quote the Supreme Court, "In short, we are convinced that a sentencing
court may consider conduct of which a defendant has been acquitted." By
what right? The "long train of abuses and usurpations" continues to grow.

A powerful, and empowering, alternative to established media is emerging
via InterNet TV!
LIBERTARIAN TV

Those of you who remember the Liberty Round Table's Simon
Jester project of several years ago can skip the rest of this article
and go directly to Simon's new site to get started! Simon has
several new ideas to get your brain back into "gremlin mode,"
including an email campaign specially designed for Halloween.
For those who weren't around for SJ's last appearance, a brief
explanation is in order. Based on the little devil created by Robert
A. Heinlein in the sci-fi classic "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress,"
Simon Jester was the clever creation of a group of Loonies (lunar
revolutionaries) fomenting rebellion. "Simon" tormented the lunar
government with catchy little jokes, ditties, poems, slogans and
cartoons, always signing his work with a little cartoon image of a
grinning devil. Several years ago, the Knights of Non-Aggression at
Liberty Round Table adopted SJ and started spreading the liberty
meme, planting the seeds of liberty and signing their work with the
SJ logo.
SJ is back ... and better than ever. Realizing that busy activists
may not have time to think up their own "liberty slogans" or may
not have the artistic skills to format cards, flyers and posters, the
SJ website offers a "starter kit" to download SJ business cards,
sticky labels and, just in time for November 5th, election signs
("Why settle for the lesser of two evils") and "democracy" fliers.
The card and sticker sets carry catchy freedom oriented quotes
and slogans to get started -- "Writing to Washington won't help;
he's dead!" "When only the police have guns, it's called a police
state." "Fear of government is the second step to wisdom." They're
all set up to print on standard Avery business card and shipping
label forms. You can also download blank cards with the SJ logo
and put in quotes and slogans of your choice.
The SJ campaign is designed for a "cell of one," but if every time
your "cell of one" does a Simon Jesterish activity, you add the SJ
logo, it gives the appearance of a widespread organized
"resistence" ... without the bother (or danger) of going to meetings,
deciding on projects by consensus or vote, etc.
If enough people start spreading the SJ "meme," soon the logo
itself will stand as a comment on any attack on freedom: a
government building, alphabet soup agency vehicle, political sign
for a particularly statist politico, etc. (Of course, if you put a logo or
sticker on private property, you should consider whether the owner
might not appreciate it.)
How will we know if we're succeeding? Well,if any of you see a SJ
card, logo, etc. and you know that YOU didn't put it there, that'll be
a clue ... remember the peace sign in the 60s?
For ideas on where to put the posters, cards, fliers etc., see "What
to Do with this Stuff" at the SJ website for pointers and let your
imagination be your guide. No one knows YOUR community like
you do ... plant the seeds there as only you know how to. This
includes your "cyber community" ... SJ also has ASCII "cyber
logos" to add to emails ... for an example, look at my signature on
this column!)
Several of the "anonymous" past actions we've discussed in the
Action of the Week can easily be used in our "freedom gremlin"
project, by simply adding the SJ logo, such as posting liberty
oriented cartoons (If I Can't Dance) or sharing freedom oriented
books.
This week, let's each download some SJ materials to carry with us
in our backpacks or purses and spread judiciously through our
communities. Let's get started making the SJ logo as prevalent as
the peace sign in the 60s ... with, hopefully, the same pervasive
effect in changing our culture.
Til next week
For freedom!
Mary Lou
Links:
o Simon Jester Website
http://www.free-market.net/rd/783208387.html
o Bush-Bashing Email Campaign
http://www.free-market.net/rd/475665969.html
o Release a freedom book into the wild
http://www.free-market.net/features/list-archives/activism/msg00065.html
o Action of the Week archive
http://www.free-market.net/features/list-archives/activism/maillist.html
Please forward and copy freely, and include the following:
The Freedom Action of the Week is a feature of Free-Market.Net
http://www.free-market.net/features/action/
Opinions expressed are purely those of our writers and editors.
To subscribe or unsubscribe to this and other lists, click to:
http://www.free-market.net/features/lists/
To support the Action of the Week and other activities of FMN
and The Henry Hazlitt Foundation, please make a tax-deductible
donation now:
https://ssl3.imagiware.com/hazlitt/ccard.html

----------
CCLE
A new bill in Congress seeks to make the Mazatec ceremonial
plant Salvia divinorum and its active component,
Salvinorin A, outlawed drugs. The Center for Cognitive
Liberty & Ethics is organizing and preparing opposition,
and calling upon all interested people to express their
opposition to this unwarranted extension of the U.S. war
on drugs. (10/22/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/71688111.html

----------
Citizens for a Sound Economy
by Wayne T. Brough
"Recently, Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill announced his
distaste for the complexities of the current tax code,
sparking hope that there will be serious discussions of
fundamental tax reform once the dust from November's
elections settles. Streamlining the tax code can reduce
the burden as well as the administrative and compliance
costs of the current tax code." (10/22/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/272285150.html

Now more than ever, NV needs you
----------
If you were thinking about donating to the Marijuana Policy
Project's ballot initiative campaign in Nevada, there
are only 12 days left until November 5. And The latest
statewide poll shows that the ballot initiative is still
trailing by a mere 44% to 46%, with 10% undecided. That
2% down margin has held since the polls opened statewide
on Saturday. (10/24/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/249090539.html

NSA to spy domestically?
----------
Politech
by Declan McCullagh
"The head of the National Security Agency said last week
that Congress might want to aim the most powerful surveillance
system in the world at American citizens." (10/21/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/133089994.html

----------
American Policy Center
by Tom DeWeese
"We seem to have one property right left. The right to keep
paying taxes and the mortgage payments as we live by the
permission of the government. We have been losing our
freedoms because we have lost the knowledge of why this
nation was founded." (10/23/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/125108161.html

Judges throw out odor-based drug bust
----------
Houston Chronicle
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals ruled that "the odor of
marijuana, standing alone, does not authorize a
warrantless search and seizure in a home." (10/24/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/634011481.html

CIA ramps up presence at FBI offices
----------
Las Vegas Sun
The CIA is increasing its presence at FBI field offices by
assigning intelligence officers to domestic
anti-terrorism teams. CIA agents are limited by law in
what they can do domestically. (10/24/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/631881336.html

Las Vegas Review Journal
by Vin Suprynowicz
"[A] nation once proud of our tradition of breaking bad
laws by throwing the tea in Boston harbor, or acquitting
John Peter Zenger of libel, or by defying the Fugitive
Slave Act, is now a land of dutiful little drones, enforcing
and obeying any edict of the central state." (10/20/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/350224391.html

Tech Central Station
by Stephen W. Stanton
Few in Congress understand that double taxation amounts to
a misguided "sin tax," punishing companies for simply
paying dividends. As a result, companies pay fewer
dividends than ever. (10/18/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/601221601.html
----------
Rocky Mountain News
The ACLU has submitted a list of 456 individuals and 70
groups to the Denver City Attorney's Office, seeking
confirmation that the names are included in illegally
collected police department files. (10/21/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/53983109.html
----------
LA Times
The Pentagon wants to scale back the $1-billion program and
focus more on combating terrorism. Such a move could
meet strong opposition in Congress. (Free registration
required) (10/20/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/505585183.html
----------
Lansing State Journal
Michigan can resume testing welfare recipients for drugs, a
federal court ruled. The decision could have a major
impact nationwide. (10/21/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/46802583.html

Dick Armey, the retiring House majority leader, told the
president that "his Justice Department was out of
control." The ACLU also says that the Justice Department
is a danger to civil liberties. (10/18/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/455114137.html

Al Qaeda And "Radical" Islam - Is There Any Other Kind? By Dorothy Anne Seese - Sierra Times.com
ISLAMISTS WORLDWIDE WATCH
Pocatello, Idaho October 16, 2002

The following article by Anne Seese of Sierra Times,
ponders Islam and radicalism
**********************************************
Al Qaeda And "Radical" Islam - Is There Any Other Kind?

By Dorothy Anne Seese

Published 10. 15. 02 at 21:59 Sierra Time

Mohammed was no gift from God to this world. Right from the outset,
this man who claimed to be a prophet put together a religion around
which he could rally various Arab tribes and move into non-Arab
tribal areas of the 7th century. He wasn't a nation builder, he was a
religious empire builder.

What no political force could do -- get warring tribes to find a
commonality other than removing each other's heads for the sake
of fun and a bit of tribal glory -- a religion peculiar to "his" people
(the worshippers of his god Allah) could at least partially accomplish.
Thus, rather than be just another tribal leader out of some whack
village in Arabia, he became the great spiritual leader of a new religion.
Further, he had a clever plan for his new religion. He would and did
go back to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Yahweh, the God
of both Jews and Christians (although Christians see God as incarnate i
n Jesus Christ and Jews do not) and "restore the true religion" that got
corrupted by Jews and Christians. The way to restoration was to
convert or kill -- nice program for a peaceful religion.

He provided both a unique religion for the Arabs and non-Arabic
Muslims that would direct their hatred toward all infidels (all those
who would not bow to Allah) and he would give his forces a built-in
enemy ... Christians and Jews.

So tell me now -- when was Islam a peaceful religion?

Were the Selucid and Ottoman Turks a peaceful people? Were the
Islamic Persians a peaceful sort? How did the Assassins get their name?
By assassinating folks. The fanciful Arabian Nights saga was about as
realistic as a Rambo movie. Only the Rambo movie was probably as
violent as most Islamic leaders and their armies.

However, religion has served Islam well as a vehicle to carry out its
plan of conquering the planet for Allah. Seems people invent "gods"
to suit their mission, rather than searching out and being obedient to
God. But that pattern goes back to Abel, Cain and the mess in Eden.
People want a god like themselves. As a whole, they want nothing to
do with the God who IS. However, if the United States is going to
take on radical Islam, then we must ask ourselves: What part of Islam
is not "radical?"

Are the nations of the Arab League openly condemning the acts of
Al Qaeda? Not really. They silently applaud the heinous attacks on
the innocent civilians of any western culture who travel abroad or
stay home, who are vulnerable to terrorist attacks as and when
Al Qaeda sees fit to blow up someone. It isn't just Jews, or professing
Christians, it's anyone from the Western Culture who is fair game now.
Transforming Bali from the tropical paradise of tourists' dreams into a
nightmare of blood and carnage is a fun sport to Al Qaeda.

And where's the outrage from the League of Arab Nations? Where are
the apologies profusely flowing from the mosques in America and other
western nations? Umm ... either they aren't there or they are a lip service
to appease the world and keep an angry and militarily superior western
civilization from making a bit of scorched earth out of the nations of the
Arab League and their cohorts in non-Arab but Islamic Iran and
Indonesia.

What is annoying, even disgusting, is the attempt of the western cultures
to gloss over the facts about Islam's history and doctrine to keep the oil
flowing. That says something about American and European greed and
lack of integrity. And their political correctness ... this "moral equivalence"
thing that keeps popping up and at which our forefathers in the US would
have cringed in horror. However, all religions are not equal. Jihad is killing
people around the globe under the flag of a shadowy Al Qaeda that seems
to thrive in cells in any nation, but is funded and protected by the religion of
Islam and the nations that embrace that belief.

When one hears "radical Islam" it's hardly possible to keep from asking,
"which part is not radical?"

Has anyone seen a Buddhist revolution or "jihad" come to pass? Are
Confucionists killing people at random? Hindus have a war going on
continually but against whom? Islam! Mostly against Islamic Pakistan.
For all the contemplative, nonviolent religions in the world that just mind
their own business, the nations of the world are willing to say "Islam is
basically a peaceful religion." Ha. They're basically the world's oil
merchants. However, their history of violence goes back fourteen
centuries, so it isn't wise to buy into the idea that it's the west's prosperity
that has the Islamics torqued.

The fact is, they've always been a violent people in a violent religion
founded by a violent madman!

Now it is evident that Christianity was not always Christian in thought,
word or deed. It is evident that Christianity has suffered much from man's
evil nature and has gone far, far astray from what Jesus Christ taught.
That is not any justification for calling Jihad a "holy" war. To be holy is
to be godlike. Holiness comes from God Almighty. Jesus Christ is holy,
not all who call themselves His followers are ... but that is to beg the
point and distract from the present evils of Islam.

Just when ... when in its fourteen centuries of history ... was Islam peaceful?

And if it is a warlike religion, why don't we just declare a religious war and
be done with it?

Probably because there's money involved. Man cannot serve God and
mammon, Jesus said so, man has proved it. That's no reason not to declare
war against Islam and take out the evil of a really horrid religion.

There are other religions for any "peaceful" Muslims ... they can become
Hopi or Buddhist or .. whatever. They might even become Christians, and
be more zealous for Christ than many westerners. But Mohammed and his
warlike religion designed from the start to obliterate Christians and Jews
under the crescent flag? No way is that a peaceful religion.

Notice: This article is not politically correct and makes no claim to such.
It's just honest.


� 2002 SierraTimes.com (unless otherwise noted) Your Feedback.....Forward This
Article...Print Friendly Version..

It is unfortunate but unless I awake to a disaster of some sort, I am bored for the rest of the day, awaiting a disaster to get my fix. Isn't that weird but a sign of the times??

WROL-AM 950 Boston

chuck morse show

Tue, Oct 8, 2002; by Dave Winer.
A new category
http://davenet.userland.com/

Every once in a while a new category of software catches on. It may borrow features from previous categories, but in some way, it represents a new activity with a computer. Often the category existed for a while, even years, before it caught on. That was true of weblogs, and now it's true of another category, news aggregators.

We did our first aggregator in 1999, a centralized application called My.UserLand. It was a contemporary of My.Netscape, which took the same information, in a format called RSS http://backend.userland.com/rss , and displayed it in a series of boxes, one for each source. Our software presented a stream of new items, the newest items at the top of the stream (most visible) and the older items towards the bottom. In Web terminology this form of presentation is called reverse-chronological.

Today, our aggregator is decentralized, it's a key part of our Radio UserLand software http://radio.userland.com/ . We have competition, our software is not the only desktop news aggregator on the market. There's a lot more to say about the category, but first a definition.

What is a News Aggregator?

A news aggregator is "software that periodically reads a set of news sources, in one of several XML-based formats, finds the new bits, and displays them in reverse-chronological order on a single page."

How does a news aggregator work?

Every hour the aggregator reads the "feeds" you're subscribed to, as few as a half-dozen, or as many as you like. When you see an item that you want to amplify with your own comments, or pass on to others in your organization or interest group, with a couple of clicks you can "route" it to the home page of your weblog. Aggregators and weblog software are flip-sides of the same idea. Weblogs are for writing, aggregators for reading, and at the intersection is routing.

Amateurs and pros

I'm subscribed to quite a few sources, and the range of sources is significant. Consider that I get news from the New York Times, the BBC, and from weblogs like Sam Ruby (an expert programmer), Jon Udell (InfoWorld columnist), John Robb (he works with me at UserLand), Mike Chambers (works for Macromedia, writes about Flash), The Shifted Librarian, Ernie the Attorney, analyst Kevin Werbach, Ed Cone (North Carolina columnist), book author Christian Crumlish, my own weblog (Scripting News). I also subscribe to News.Com, The Motley Fool, The Register, Doc Searls, a local newspaper in South Carolina (Go Upstate), O'Reilly's Safari service and Patrick Logan (a developer). I am currently subscribed to 73 feeds, some people I know are subscribed to as many as 300!

The key point is that I don't have to visit each of these sites to find out what's new. My computer, running aggregator software, does it for me, every hour, automatically. The information is formatted in XML, but I am barely aware of that, as with all compelling apps, the technical details are tucked out of the way. Like all open formats, it's easy to figure out what's going on. Here's an example of the XML behind news aggregators.

Not only am I getting news from professional news organizations, but I am also hearing from people and non-news organizations who make a difference to me. Rarely an hour goes by without something interesting happening, my mind is stimulated, I get new ideas, and of course I share them. It's all about choice, customization, and communication. No one has the same virtual newspaper as mine, and mine is changing all the time.

Over the last few months it's been interesting to watch many of the smart people in weblog-land discover the convenience and power of news aggregators. In many ways it feels like aggregators are where weblogs were a couple of years ago, just about to be discovered by a much larger group of people.

Dave Winer

See also:
Jon Udell's BYTE column on personal RSS aggregators.
http://www.byte.com/documents/s=7181/byt1022183228615/0527_udell.html

Screen shot of the aggregator built into Radio UserLand.
http://radio.weblogs.com/0001015/images/2002/10/08/aggScreen.gif

FOR THE TECH SAVVY, THE BUZZWORD IS BLAWG
Simple Web Sites Let Lawyers Share Knowledge, Opinions

BY JASON KRAUSE

Ernest Svenson is a blawger, and he doesn�t mind saying so.

Svenson, technology partner with Gordon, Arata, McCollam, Duplantis & Eagan in New Orleans, runs Ernie the Attorney, a typical Web log, or blog for short. A blog is basically a simple Web site with plain text messages usually written by one person, along with related news snippets or hyperlinks to articles.

Svenson�s site has a mix of tidbits about blogging and technology, and general-interest news items with running commentary Svenson writes in his spare moments. And, because his blog deals with law-related matters, it fits into the subcategory of blawgs.

For Svenson, blawging started as a diversion. "This was just an interesting thing I was experimenting with in my spare time," he says. "But when I started getting hits from more people other than just my family, it became clear that this was turning into something bigger than just a vanity project."

A small but growing number of lawyers are turning to Web logs as a tool for their law practice. Blawgs resemble a kind of self-published, online newsletter. They are being touted as a communications tool to reach the nation�s lawyers, a public relations tool to display a lawyer�s knowledge of the law, and even a knowledge management system for lawyers to share expertise within a firm.

Setting up a blawg is easier than building a Web site, thanks to a number of free services, like blogger.com. However, most blawg publishers say the free services tend to crash, which is why most have upgraded to a paid service, usually costing about $40 a year.

Once blawgers set up the basic design of their sites, all they need to do is send their postings to their Web log service. Readers can often comment on the site, creating a feedback loop between the reader and blawger.

But what interest might someone�s random musings be to the average lawyer? Blawgers say that these kinds of Web pages allow them to communicate with people of a shared interest, creating a place for lawyers to keep up with the latest news and ideas in their field.

"Almost every law firm is trying to build a knowledge management system for itself to take advantage of the expertise within the firm," Svenson says. "But with blawgs, it happens organically. If you gave your lawyers their own blawgs, pretty soon everyone within the firm could see who knows the most about different topics."

Eugene Volokh, a UCLA School of Law professor, runs The Volokh Conspiracy, a blawg for readers interested in technology and civil liberty issues. He believes blawgs are a natural outlet for lawyers to fully immerse themselves in their field.

"To me, it may not be entirely practical, but lawyers are a gregarious people, � [and] a lot of them don�t have an outlet for their interests," he says. "Blawgs give them that."

The number of people reading blawgs is still small but growing. A popular site like Instapundit might get 50,000 hits a day. Volokh says he registers 3,000 to 3,500 visitors most days.

"It�s a great PR tool, too," Volokh says. "I�ve never met Howard Bashman, but if anyone ever asks me if I know an appellate lawyer in Pennsylvania, I�m going to recommend Bashman because I�ve read his blawg [How Appealing] and found him to be insightful and well-informed."

But the main concern for lawyers will probably always be that Web logs can be too time-consuming to read, to create or to maintain. The Web log publishers who commented for this story typically spend an hour or more a day working on their site, either at work or after hours.

"Are blawgs useful or just a waste of time? I�d say neither," Svenson says. "It�s too early to say exactly what their usefulness is, but it�s clear something interesting is happening."

Other popular blawgs include the following:

� Scotusblog is all about goings on at the U.S. Supreme Court, published by Goldstein and Howe, a law firm specializing in supreme court cases.

� Law Meme is a legal Web log from the Yale Law School.

� Lessig Blog, it should be no surprise, was launched by Lawrence Lessig, one of the best-known legal scholars on Internet-related issues.

� West Virginia Supreme Court keeps lawyers updated on the latest news, decisions and other announcements from that state�s supreme court.

� The Trademark Blog is aimed at trademark lawyers. It is written by Marty Schwimmer, a trademark attorney.

�2002 ABA Journal

Canada`s Goldcorp shines in gloomy stock markets

October 10, 2002 11:13:38 (ET)
LONDON, Oct 10 (Reuters) - While global equity markets sink ever lower, stocks in a mid-size Canadian gold producer Goldcorp (GG,Trade) have outperformed some of the world's best known companies, the firm's top executive said on Thursday.

Speaking to potential investors at a gold forum in London, organised by Canada's Sprott Securities, Robert McEwen said his company was the "ultimate gold stock", boasting a compound annual growth of 36 percent since 1993.

"We have significantly outperformed the market over the past few years," he said.

McEwen said that $100 invested in Goldcorp in 1993 would now be worth $1,773, compared with $1,275 for Microsoft, $679 for IBM and a paltry $251 for the Nasdaq index.

Goldcorp's success stems from its discovery of giant high grade gold deposits in Canada's Red Lake mine in Western Ontario -- now considered as the richest gold mine in the world.

With no debts, no hedge book and rising gold prices, cash rich Goldcorp even started to hold back some of its 600,000 ounces of annual production in inventory last year.

The company has also bought gold and McEwen said Goldcorp now has more than five tonnes of gold in its inventories.

"We have a strong belief that gold prices are going higher," McEwen said "We have a positive leverage to gold which is unrestricted to the upside."

Hedging, a standard financial tool aimed at locking in profits if prices dip by pre-selling unmined gold at forward, has fallen out of favour with major producers as gold prices have firmed to their highest level in 2-1/2 years this year.

"What's very clear is that the market dislikes hedgers," he said, adding that two-thirds of the gold industry world-wide hedges its production.

LOW COSTS

Goldcorp also boasts one of the lowest production costs in the world -- with an average cost per ounce of $65 for its Red Lake mine and $96 overall.

That compares with costs of closer to $200 for major gold companies.

"We're looking for innovation and to break the mindset of the industry," McEwen told investors.

His company even turned to the Internet two years ago, offering $500,000 in prize money to help pinpoint the best spot to drill for gold, attracting detailed plans from some 50 geologists, academics and miners.

"Fifty percent of the proposals matched those of Goldcorp's, but more importantly, 50 percent didn't -- giving us a lot of new possibilities.

McEwen believes firmly in gold's ability to notch up impressive gains over the next few years, especially given the current climate of low interest rates, ailing stock markets and a weaker dollar.

"When there is no confidence in the market...buy gold," he said, adding that over the last 18 months, the yellow metal has been the best performing asset class.

Gold prices ((XAU=)) have seen a hefty move higher over the past year, culminating in a 2-1/2 year peak at $330.30 in June. They have since backtracked to the current level of $318.

On the New York Stock Exchange on Thursday, Goldcorp was quoted at $9.54, compared with just over $12.00 back in June at the peak of the gold price rally.

� Copyright 2001 Reuters. Click Here for Limitations and Restrictions on Use.

NV marijuana foes replace stumbling spokesman
----------
Las Vegas Sun
The chief spokesman for law enforcement groups opposing
Nevada's marijuana legalization ballot question has been
replaced after alleging a drug cartel link to the
legalization effort. (10/10/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/542020075.html

Pair martyred in effort to legalize marijuana
----------
Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel
Dennis and Denise Schilling were driven to hang themselves
in a motel under the threat of prison and forfeiture of their
home for growing marijuana and hallucinogenic mushrooms. Their
children and others see them as martyrs. (10/09/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/691317901.html

Asset models require radical surgery
Most investors ignore cash, gold, commodities, silver

By Thom Calandra, CBS.MarketWatch.com
Last Update: 10:45 AM ET Oct 7, 2002
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) -- Investors, consumers and November voters are holding more influence over the U.S. economy than at any time since the 1991 recession.

The president of the United States is courting voters and legislators with a Monday night speech about Iraq. The Federal Reserve is keeping fingers crossed on the mood of shoppers. Mortgage investors are wondering when the home refinancing boom will stop reducing the take from their monthly income.

Individuals, for the first time in my recent memory, are beginning to ask if the stock market's demise is something more than a passing trend. At the shopping mall and alongside their kids' soccer matches, Americans are making earnest queries about the erosion of paper wealth in America.

Their concern comes after three years of what stoic investor behavior in the face of the equity storm. Some are even wondering whether it's prudent to be taking refi-cash out of their homes and spending it on home improvements or new cars when their next paycheck may evaporate with a J.P. Morgan Chase-style layoff. See the J.P. Morgan report on 4,000 possible layoffs.

Here in this corner, the view is the same as it's always been: The stinking stock market is not done stinking up the joint, nor will the contraction of stocks, corporate bonds and U.S. dollar be over anytime soon. See: Dow destined for 1,000-point drops.

"We are either going to inflate out or deflation will (persist)," says Michael A. Berry, a former professor of quantitative analysis who favors radical shifts in asset allocation for ordinary investors. "The U.S. equity market is, by historic standards, still significantly overvalued even with the declines in the spring and summer of 2002. It is still replete with the psychology of hope each time a bear rally occurs."

The psychology of hope centers on those one-day, 300-point Dow rallies we see each week. While ordinary folks are praying the rallies signal a return to good times, professionals and prudent investors are using the one-day inflations to sell their holdings and shift into cash.

Berry, who holds a doctorate in finance, recently presented a paper at the San Francisco Money Show. In it, he refers to Gustav Le Bon's 1895 book, "The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind." Le Bon explains, "When by various processes an idea has ended by penetrating into the minds of crowds, it possesses an irresistible power and brings about a series of effects, opposition to which is bootless."

In real life October 2002, this means most Americans, snow-stormed by a decades-long rush into stocks, have "forgotten to diversify, forgotten asset allocation, forgotten that markets always revert to their mean value," says Berry.

Wall Street doesn't make life any easier. The big banks and brokerages routinely ignore gold, silver and agricultural commodities in their asset allocation models. The Wall Street and London banks pay lip service to cash, an investment that is not even on the radar screen for ordinary folks seeking their cruise-ship retirements in 10 or 20 years.

The few Americans out there who restyled their portfolios two years ago, or even two months ago, almost certainly weren't considering cash as a powerful investment alternative. Forget about gold and commodities in general -- even though these two classes are up about 18 percent since Jan. 2.

"Gold has been such an under-performing asset class for so long (last 20 years) that it has been forgotten," says Kevin Lane at Technimentals Research in New York. "Not to mention not too many gold and silver companies pay banking fees." In these days of double-dealing Wall Street banks, there is no business reason for a J.P. Morgan or a Goldman Sachs to advertise gold in their portfolio models.

"Investing," says Berry, "is terribly difficult because we are human," Berry tells me, "Our brains are wired to sell at the bottom and buy at the top. We are, without question, creatures of hope and fear at market extremes."

Berry says some 40 percent or more of Americans' portfolios require surgery. His top choice for a quick fix is a little silver. At the just-finished Denver gold show, Pan American Silver (PAAS) CEO Ross J. Beaty took a half-hour to tell me about the new, growing uses for the precious metal group's little brother. See: Gold crowd is growth crowd.

These uses include silver as a possible replacement for the bacteria-battling agent chlorine. Medical uses as disinfectants and anti-bacterials are also growing, says Beaty, who serves as president of the Silver Institute this year.

Berry also points to anti-microbial silver compounds that combat pathogens, such as Legionnaires Disease, salmonella and e-coli bacteria. Silver solutions that could prolong the life of lettuce and other produce are also in the works, he says.

"Warren Buffett purchased 129.7 million ounces of silver in 1998. He must believe in its worth because there is a significant cost of carry to the metal," says Berry. "George Soros and his Quantum Fund own 32 percent of Apex Silver Mines (SIL), which has a 500-million ounce proven deposit in Bolivia. Bill Gates owns at least 10 percent of Pan American Silver."

Even with demand for silver increasing about 4 percent a year, ordinary investors are ignoring the metal, Berry explains.

And then, there is the short angle. Large gold producers that mine silver as a by-product, chief among them Barrick Gold (ABX), have short-sale, deferred-price and other hedged and leasing positions that effectively cap the metal's price by adding to the paper-trading of silver.

The annual production of silver (less than 1 billion ounces a year) amounts to 2 percent of this short position, Berry says. "While I am not predicting a short squeeze, consider the outcome should there be a short squeeze," the former professor says.

Spot silver (82799W01) Monday was selling for about $4.50 an ounce, or about the same level as it was a year ago.

The US must rule all nations. How Dare Canada Set Its Own Pot Policy
http://www.guardian.co.uk/elsewhere/journalist/story/0,7792,806289,00.html

In considering the decriminalisation of marijuana, Canada's outgoing prime minister may make a hash of US relations, writes Anne McIlroy amcilroy@globeandmail.ca

Monday October 7, 2002

Prime Minister Jean Chr�tien seems prepared to risk the ire of the United States and decriminalise the use of marijuana.

Last week, the Liberal government laid out its agenda for this session of parliament and included plans to decriminalize cannabis.

Mr Chr�tien, who has announced he will retire in 2004, is sniffing the wind for a legacy.
Decriminalising marijuana has the sweet smell of something Canadians might remember him for, so the normally cautious Mr Chr�tien appears to be prepared to move ahead. Not that he has ever smoked any himself.

"When I was young the word marijuana did not exist. I didn't know. I learned about the world long after that. It was too late to try it, " Mr Chr�tien, 67, recently told reporters.

But his 39-year-old justice minister confesses to having inhaled. "Of course I tried it before. Obviously," said Martin Cauchon. He is keen to decriminalise marijuana, which would mean that people caught smoking the drug would get tickets instead of heavy jail sentences, punitive fines or a criminal record.

The UK took a similar step earlier this year. But Britain isn't next door to the United States, where the government of President Bush continues to push an aggressive zero tolerance drug policy, for both itself and its neighbours.

John Walters, the Bush administration's drug tsar, has publicly stated that if Canada decriminalises marijuana it could face serious disruptions to border trade, which is crucial to the Canadian economy. Other US politicians have warned of dire consequences if Canada becomes the pot patch of the north.

Fear of angering the US is one reason why Mr Chr�tien has left himself room to back away from decriminalising marijuana. He has said his government will look at decriminalising pot, but has stopped short of actually promising to do so.

But momentum is clearly building. Last month a Canadian senate committee made headlines, recommending that anyone over the age of 16 be able to smoke marijuana freely.

If it is ever implemented, the recommendation would mean joints would be legally available to teenagers long before a pint of beer. The report, which filled four volumes, was extensively researched. It also urged amnesty for the 600,000 Canadians convicted of possessing marijuana.

The senate committee argued that the recreational use of pot is no more harmful that smoking cigarettes or drinking alcohol, both legal vices that provide healthy annual tax revenues. There is no reason marijuana shouldn't be legal and sold at the local store, the committee said.

Canada is also moving ahead with plans to allow the use of medical marijuana, for people undergoing chemotherapy or suffering from HIV/Aids.

In November, a special committee of Canada's House of Commons is due to report on the non-medical use of drugs. If it recommends decriminalisation, it will give Mr Chr�tien the green light to move ahead.

There is no chance he will follow the advice of the senate committee and legalise marijuana, but decriminalisation looks increasingly like safe middle ground. Pot wouldn't be legal, but getting caught smoking it wouldn't mean a jail term and restricted job possibilities.

Yes, the US government would be upset, but a retired Mr Chr�tien won't be around to face the consequences. His heir apparent, former finance minister Paul Martin, would be in charge. He might not mind standing up to Mr Bush on the issue. His aides have let it be known that he ate a hash brownie when he was a much younger man.

Schools test urine to detect student tobacco use
----------
Baltimore Sun
School officials around the country are increasingly
delving into students' urine to detect tobacco use.
"We're making schools like prisons," points out Shawn
Heller, a students' rights advocate. (10/08/02)
http://www.free-market.net/rd/814858593.html

DR SEUSS ON AGING

I cannot see.
I cannot pee.
I cannot chew.
I cannot screw.
Oh, my God, what can I do?

My memory shrinks.
My hearing stinks.
No sense of smell.
I look like hell.
My mood is bad -- can you tell?

My body's drooping.
Have trouble pooping.
The Golden Years have come at last.
The Golden Years can kiss my ass.

1. Obviously a sniper's rifle.
2. From scene of blood; obviously a head shot.
3. Shot from a distance.
4. Random.
5. No Motive.
6. Near D.C. where gov't. workers live.
I am not saying it is but it could be.

"THE SUCKER TRAPS", Part 3
by Sherman H. Skolnick 10/3/2
skolnick@ameritech.net
http://www.skolnicksreport.com

THE IMPENDING BOND COLLAPSE

What is it that they do not teach at the most supposedly prestigious business schools, such as at Harvard or Rockefeller's University of Chicago?

Not part of the curriculum are the ways in which "the powers that be", the Establishment, the Ultra Rich, the Ruling Class---whatever is labeled as THEM---further enrich themselves on the backs of the common people.

How, then, do the sons and daughters of the Aristocracy learn how to do such things? Simple. It rubs off on them just by growing up among their elders. It becomes second nature to them. Since the more ordinary people do not grow up in such an environment, they do not ever understand the mindset of plutocrats..

THE UNSPOKEN PRINCIPLES OF FINANCIAL AND GEOPOLITICAL RULE

[1] DO NOT FOR A MOMENT HESITATE TO DO WHAT IS NECESSARY TO YOUR AGENDA. CONSIDERATIONS OF MORALITY AND HUMANITY ARE NOT TO BE CONSIDERED. IF YOU CAUSE GREAT RUIN OR BLOODSHED, SO WHAT!

The Ultra Rich felt endangered by their creation, the Soviet Union. So the oligarchs in the U.S. and England financed the rise of Adolf Hitler, as a bulwark against the Moscow government.

For examples, refer to "Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution" by Antony C. Sutton and also his opus, "How the Order Creates War and Revolution"(the Order being such as the Skull & Bones Secret Society) and his book, "Wall Street and the Rise of Hitler".

The very wealthy Americans such as the Rockefellers, shared profits with Nazi big business even in the midst of World War 2. "Trading With the Enemy" by Charles Higham.

The British Monarchy, secretly pro-Nazi, through their ownership of Prudential Insurance Company of Newark, New Jersey, controlled and selected what targets, if any, in wartime Germany were bombed by the Allies. Knowing the value and insurance of corporate properties in Nazi Germany, Prudential was in charge of the Strategic Bombing Survey. (A well-equipped library has books on the S.B.S.)

So, for example, the Nazi chemical octopus, I.G. Farben, was NOT bombed and was 93 per cent intact at the end of the conflict. (See "I.G. Farben" by Richard Sasuly, a book by a U.S. military officer in charge of the end of the war survey of Farben.).

Because of the business tie-in with General Electric of the U.S., their facilities in Nazi Germany were not bombed. [See, Sutton's documented work, "Wall Street and the Rise of Hitler".]

[2] PUSH AN IMPENDING FINANCIAL WRECKAGE ON TO THE SUCKERS.

The pundits for the super rich pushed the high tech wreckage onto the ordinary people. So, mouth-pieces for the major brokerage houses promoted the telecoms, the computer wonders, and the energy shysters, onto ordinary people, as a "good investment". More and more of those dot.coms are into bankruptcy or soon there.

[3] AFTER A FINANCIAL MARKET HAS BEEN PLUNDERED BY THE ULTRA RICH, PUSH THE ORDINARY SO-CALLED "INVESTORS" ONTO SOME OTHER FINANCIAL TRICK, TO CLIP THEM.

That is sort of like the crowd rushing from one side to another. An analogy from history might be useful. Early in the 20th Century, a major Chicago-based company arranged an outing for their employees. Over a thousand persons gathered, like for a party, on a boat in the river in Chicago. To watch some other event, all those on the vessel ran to the other side of the ship, which, thus unbalanced, capsized. Nine hundred ordinary employees were drowned. Of course, that was an accident.

NOT an accident is the way the suckers fleeced in the equity markets are being shoved into BONDS. Cynics purposely mispronounce it as BOMBS. The innocents are thus made to run from one side of the financial ship to the other. Will the financial markets vessel capsize?

Various types of bonds are vulnerable, so are so-called "money market funds". By the time you see, if at all, the periodic prospectus of a money market fund, the data is stale. You do NOT find out what the fund is into NOW. Are they trying to temporarily boost the return by hocus-pocus book-keeping, called derivatives? Are they using highly hazardous hedging tricks? Are they invested in commercial paper of companies on the verge of bankruptcy? Brokers pushing clients into "money market" funds are not about to tell you.

A typical conversation of a broker to a client. "So, you do not like stocks? Fine. We'll put you into Municipal Bonds". Not identified are the municipal bonds actually issued for private and non-governmental purposes. In a bad recession, will the purposes generate enough funds to pay the municipal bondholders? And get this. Municipal bond GUARANTEE FUNDS are considered by savvy sorts as a bad joke. Do they have enough reserves to make good possible widespread municipal bond defaults?

Then there are the so-called "Federal Agency" securities. These are known in the financial trade as GSE, "government-sponsored enterprises". Fannie Mae, Ginnie Mae, Freddie Mac. These securities and mutual funds supposedly investing in them as a go-between for mutual fund holders, are peddled by brokers and others as if they are securities actually guaranteed by the Full Faith and Credit of the U.S. Treasury.

Sponsored by Vanguard Funds is Bob Brinker, a long-time pusher on the radio who urges listeners to invest in mutual funds holding Ginnie Mae securities. He tells the listeners that such securities are backed by the U.S. Treasury. Some, however, have substantial doubts.

Not much publicized was the Dow Jones wire service item, dated 8/5/02, datelined New Orleans. "Government officials and investment experts worried about the impact on stock prices of alleged corporate accounting fraud are paying too little attention to risks inherent in other securities widely regarded as being safe, according to William Poole, president of the St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank.

"Speaking at the Council of State Governments' Southern Legislative Conference, Poole said that certain government-sponsored private agencies, including Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Home Loan Bank System, are undercapitalized relative to their debt load.

"He said if the imbalances of these and other so-called government-sponsored enterprises go undressed, they could lead eventually to a capital crisis that would send a shock through the U.S. housing market."

Further referring to Poole, "Similarly, he said, 'no one should underestimate the potential importance of the ambiguity over the financial status of the GSEs.'

"A serious problem, he said, is 'the market prices GSE debt as if there is a FEDERAL GUARANTEE, or a high probability of a guarantee, standing behind the debt. YET, THERE IS NO EXPLICIT GUARANTEE IN THE LAW'.

"Poole recommended that the federal government act to dispel the notion THAT FANNIE MAE, FREDDIE MAC and some other GSEs ARE FULLY BACKED BY THE GOVERNMENT." (Emphasis added.)

Typical of their method of operation, the Ultra Rich, having taken themselves ouf of so-called "Federal Agency" securities, have pushed them onto the suckers who sooner or later will get clipped.

Seldom mentioned is the history of U.S. Treasury securities.

Starting about the fall of 1979, was a U.S. Ruling Class liquidity crisis, falsely referred to by the press-fakers as a "U.S. Government" emergency.
To try to calm know-nothings, the head of the private central bank, the Federal Reserve, held a rare joint press conference with then President Jimmy Carter. The commotion revolved in part around gold, considered by some as "independent money".

Tending to undermine the validity of paper money, gold prices by 1980 peaked temporarily at over 800 dollars per ounce. By 1981, U.S. Treasury securities were priced in the market to yield 16 and one-half per cent. The yield goes up as the price of the bonds go down. Some U.S. Treasury paper was priced near 75 cents to the dollar face value of the bond. The best corporate business risks paid a minimum of 21 and one-half per cent for capital transfusions.

In all the commotion, never discussed in the oil-soaked, spy-riddled monopoly press, was the way some foreign investors were protected. Since the fake embargo/oil crisis of 1973, major buyers of U.S. Treasury paper in Japan and Saudi Arabia have had THEIR purchases backed by U.S. Gold. Of course, there is no such guarantee for U.S. residents. And the alternative press in the 1970s forced a partial audit of Fort Knox. The opening of just one vault there showed the supposed depository of U.S. gold did not have it. All that was found was some orangish-looking, poor quality gold-like stuff, apparently melted down gold coins from the 1934 seizure of gold by the Roosevelt White House. Forcing even this partial audit was the Chicago-based tabloid "National Tattler", (now defunct), in which a key role was played by crusading journalist Tom Valentine. According to a published statement of a U.S. General, he led a convoy of trucks taking away most all the gold of Fort Knox about 1968 to New York. It was shipped to London, to try to stem a run on the gold in the Bank of England.

Currently, Japan owns about forty per cent of U.S. Treasury Securities. Japan needs to bail-out their greatly insolvent banks, many of which are the largest in the world. On a pre-arrangement with the American aristocracy, the Japanese may suddenly dump their U.S. Treasury paper which may suddenly, like in 1980-81, decline to 75 cents per dollar face value, or even lower. Thus in part renouncing the U.S. debt and impoverishing ordinary folks but further enriching the oligarchs.

This would be joined at the same time with an attack or "run" on the so-called "U.S. Dollar", actually hot-air Federal Reserve notes. In simple terms, the Establishment considers ordinary Americans as the enemy, to be plundered. Attention was diverted for many years by the press whores, on behalf of the Ultra Rich, leading ordinary folks to believe the "enemy" was the Moscow government, now becoming more and more a trading partner with U.S. Big Business and Big Oil.

Who dares mention an historical truism? That is, that sooner or later, every sovereignty repudiates their debt which they knew all along they could not pay back. A very astute observer on international finance, forty years ago and more, was Franz Pik. He would impart his wisdom to a select, small cricle in closed meetings. Each listener paid one thousand dollars to sit there and hear him, at a time when that amount of money was considered huge.

Who dares mention that the watering down of the paper money and the renouncing of the debt, led, in part, to the French Revolution and the chopping off of the heads of the King, Queen, and the French aristocracy. Refer to the book, "Fiat Money Inflation in France" by Andrew Dickson White, written in the 19th Century but still true now.

Studying the class structure is not a popular subject in American education. Some contend it is a feel-it-in their-bones known subject in England and elsewhere. So common Americans are generally completely blank on this, when it come to understanding Class.

Special note to the naive and poorly-informed: We are NOT shills for some type of investment house or brokerage. Hence, do NOT bombard us with requests as to WHAT we recommend to put your paper money into, to save yourself. Our upcoming follow-up story, about the impending Real Estate Crash might nevertheless be helpful.

More coming....
Stay tuned.

OBERT TORRICELLI:
THE PATHOLOGY OF CHARACTER OR A LACK THEREOF
By: Daniel Sargis
http://www.etherzone.com/2002/sarg100902.shtml


Curriculum Vitae�
Noted American author, Mark Twain, once observed that, "It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress." And the latest Democratic charade attempting an eleventh hour withdrawal of Robert "Torch" Torricelli�s Senate candidacy further reaffirms this belief.

Before delving into the specifics of this murky ethical cesspool, it might help the reader to know that as of the year 2000, the composition of America�s Congress contained the following distinguished individuals:

1. 29 members of Congress have been accused of spousal abuse.
2. 7 have been arrested for fraud.
3. 19 have been accused of writing bad checks.
4. 117 have bankrupted at least two businesses.
5. 3 have been arrested for assault.
6. 71 have credit reports so bad they can't qualify for a credit card.
7. 14 have been arrested on drug-related charges.
8. 8 have been arrested for shoplifting.
9. 21 are current defendants in lawsuits.
10. And in 1998 alone, 84 were stopped for drunk driving, but released after they claimed Congressional immunity.

It�s always good to know whom you are dealing with.

When the religious history of our time is written, maybe there will at least be a footnote for an ebullient ceremony that took place on Sept. 18 at Omega Institute, the New Age center in Rhinebeck, N.Y.
Sunlight amid tall pines. A large meeting hall pulses with a chant. Pretty girls jump up and down in ecstatic transport. Fancy grownups sway under a portrait of the Hindu god Hanuman. Sarongs, sitar, piercings, weird smoke, Nalgene water bottles, hairy bellies. And at the center of it all, seated in a wheelchair and wreathed in a lei and incense, is a bald man of 70 with a sweet smile and electric blue eyes, wearing a jean shirt, right side paralyzed by a stroke: the writer and teacher Ram Dass.

The occasion was the dedication of a new library named after Ram Dass. Leading figures from Omega�s realms�yoga, meditation psychology, past-life theory; people like James Hillman, Brian Weiss, Sharon Salzberg, SharonOlds,even_Laurance Rockefeller�had contributed to the library. It opened with 4,000 books. It is to be a place for scholarship and an archive.

"I really like having this here instead of Harvard," said Ram Dass, who now lives in California, even as a singer friend bent in tears to kiss his feet. "They�ve got Widener, and we�ve got the Ram Dass."

The celebration had an epochal flavor. The once-nimble Ram Dass is now feeble. It has been 40 years since he departed the establishment explosively and lit out for the territory, summoning so many others after him.

"I am a Western, Jewish boy from Boston who has studied Hinduism," Ram Dass once explained himself. He was born Richard Alpert to a prominent family. His father was a railroad executive who had helped to found Brandeis University. The boy became a psychologist and taught at Harvard. He had published one book, Identification and Child Rearing, when his mind got blown. His Harvard colleague Timothy Leary got him into mushrooms and acid, and before long the Freudian descriptions of consciousness and identity in which he was schooled began to seem one-dimensional, and he embarked on a search for alternative understanding with the likes of Allen Ginsberg, Aldous Huxley and Alan Watts. Then, famously, Harvard fired Richard Alpert in 1963 for telling students to drop acid.

Everyone trooped off to India, but Richard Alpert, more than any of them, got the message. He came back as Ram Dass and wrote Be Here Now, a compendium of Eastern practices for transforming consciousness. "I think it sold as many as Doctor Spock," Ram Dass said at Omega.

Ram Dass� gifts were his intellectual fearlessness and enthusiasm. He was highly intelligent, and ideas did not scare him. So he soaked up his Indian guru�s teachings on yoga, meditation and astral planes�and understanding that they worked, he wasn�t going to sit on those teachings. He had a huge ego (as he readily admitted). He came back to the States and, mingling the faculties of the scientist and the divine bullshit artist, explained Eastern ideas to young Americans.

"In a culture such as ours, the subversives are the most important people, the smugglers," says James Hillman, the esteemed Jungian analyst. "Ram Dass is one of the great smugglers. I respect all he has done and gone through, and I was happy to send books to the library."

"He was the first Western-trained psychologist to embrace and understand Eastern spiritual psychology," says Mark Epstein, the psychiatrist and Buddhist and author of Thoughts Without a Thinker: Psychotherapy from a Buddhist Perspective. "To study with Ram Dass meant listening to him perform. But it also meant tasting the various practices. He could tell stories about the Bhagavad Gita so you�d understand. He could talk for three hours, and he could make you laugh and cry �. He showed how the Eastern disciplines of yoga and meditation are ancient techniques of psychotherapy."

At one of those talks in 1970, Ram Dass explained that LSD was a technological breakthrough because it allowed materialistic Westerners to alter their consciousness. As this culture developed, he predicted, psychedelics would bring in "another set of cognitive-consciousness possibilities � so that they would become researchable, they would become studyable and explorable; and yoga, which was a dirty word seven years ago, can now be a highly respected and thoughtful science." Just what Ram Dass predicted has happened: Eastern mysticism has gained a place in any number of disciplines�medicine, psychology and the arts, to begin with. And certainly for the privileged, New Age practices have transformed religion.

Sharon Salzberg, a best-selling writer of books on meditation: "I met Ram Dass at a meditation retreat in India in 1971. I was just 18 at the time. I wanted something really practical. I didn�t want dogma or religion in any abstract sense, because that was already available, and it just wasn�t the transformation I was looking for. Ram Dass became the champion of the movement because he said, �You should participate; you shouldn�t leave it to someone else.� It�s that American strain of pragmatism."

Krishna Das, the musician: "I was 22 years old in 1969 and driving a school bus and living in New Paltz on land owned by Jungian acid-head mountain-climbers. They knew Ram Dass from other acid heads. I didn�t want an American, I wanted the real thing�I wanted Indian swamis. I was a fucking asshole; I was lost. I didn�t know how to connect with people in a deep way. These guys drove from New York to New Hampshire because Ram Dass was there, at his father�s place, and when they came back, my friend stepped out of the car, and there was like a light around him. I said, �Tell me where this guy is�I�m going.� When I met him, I knew that what I was looking for existed in the world. I didn�t know that before; I only hoped. I thought it was stuck in books, that it was tremendously remote. Today, yoga and meditation and all that stuff are out there. Then, it wasn�t there."

The other day in Rhinebeck, everyone was waiting for Ram Dass to speak, and that opportunity soon came. His speeches used to be flowing and rapid. A stroke five years ago has left him fumbling for words and connections. It has also given him a sweetness that he never had before, stripped him of his trickiness. He never cried publicly before. Now he cries when someone else cries, and smiles angelically when someone makes him an offering.

"When I got thrown out of Harvard, nobody would have expected that I would get a library named after me," Ram Dass began. He paused and said, "Huh."

He continued: "You must wonder what it feels like to have been a person named after a library. Huh. It feels peculiar. Very strange. Because I only know the other side, through my father�s eyes, when he was the chairman of the board of Brandeis, and people would say"�lapsing into Jewish dialect for a moment�"�Do you vant a library, for you and your vife?� And then the Nixon Library. But there�s the Kennedy Library, too."

Then he stopped talking for a while and seemed to weep. He was quiet for a minute.

"See, that�s what it�s like having a library named after you�just the silence."

He started out again on his story.

"Sure, I escaped from academia. But I haven�t lost respect for books. Back then there were books that I would not read in the library, because they were tomes that were dusty. But then I took mushrooms and the books looked delightful, and that led me to India and that led me to God. Funny, isn�t it? And here we are in a library."

The story still wasn�t working, and Ram Dass came at it a third time.

"I have never thought of myself as an author, but I look at all the books I wrote, and yet those books have kept me alive. They helped people, and I�d rather be a helper to relieve suffering, and an author along the way.

"But when I went to take mushrooms with Tim, we were presented in our project with the Tibetan Book of the Dead. That book was read to dying monks by other monks; it was how they should die, and going through the dying process�and it just happened that the previous Saturday night, before we were given that book, I was having an acid session, and it was the exact same thing. That�s when I got the clue that the East held the maps for what we were experiencing in our drugginess�"

He waved his left hand in the air psychedelically, making fun of the time when they were drugged out.

"There were so many things in our heads, and here was a book�but there were no books in Western psychology, no books at all were helpful. So after that, I started the Gita, the Ramayana. These were steps along the path. Steps. Books, books, books, books. And I hope this library is a step for everybody in their path."
He stopped again and seemed to understand that he had gotten the story right. "Yeah!" he said.

After that, there was a jubilant procession 100 yards or so down a hill to the library itself, a wood-framed many-sided building painted mustard with green trim. People carried incense and a statue of a guru, and other things you couldn�t be sure of. The singer Krishna Das led a chant of a Sanskrit phrase he�d first heard from Ram Dass himself at a gathering at a sculpture center in New York City 30 years ago, and then Ram Dass sat outside the library and met visitors.

I had a brief audience, crouching by the wheelchair. I asked Ram Dass whether Jewishness had any call on him anymore.

He said, "In my training in conservative Judaism, they introduced us very little to mystical Judaism. There were mystical experiences, but they wanted them to be left in the hands of historical figures. Later, I had a conversation with the rabbi who was performing my mother�s grave site ceremony. I had just come back from India: I was wearing a long beard and beads, and a white robe, and my father was on the board of the temple. I had never met the rabbi before. He took me by the elbow�"

Ram Dass grabbed me roughly by the elbow with his good hand.

"He said, �Well, what have you been doing these days?� So I told him about my maharaji and all kinds of mystical things. We were leaning against two tombstones and talking, and he said to me, �I had an experience when I was in theological school. I was taking No-Doz and not sleeping. Well, one day the book fell away as I was studying, and suddenly the desert was there.� I said, �Boy, that must have influenced your congregation.� He said, �No, I kept it to myself.� �Well, you told your wife, didn�t you?� �No,� he said."
Ram Dass shook his head sadly.

I asked him about status. He was from an establishment family. Harvard had thrown him out. Now he had a library named after him. It was a form of recognition. Was that important to him?

"This library is a love statement," he said. "And my soul knows that. Every one of them who gave � like Laurance Rockefeller, he calls and says, �I�m going to give you all the books in my library.� He can�t do enough. All these people have given and given and given. They�re giving for a feeling that they have, and it�s a spiritual feeling �.

"And yet, this recognition is also a salve to my ego."

It was intriguing to think that someone as enlightened as Ram Dass still has attachments, and still bears the wound of his expulsion from Harvard. My audience was over, and I got up and went into the library

Torrecelli says, "Is there no compassion in America anymore?" I found this to be an amazing (but true) query. What astounded me is that he just found this out. How much compassion did he show doing his dirty governmental work, I thought. Is compassion only in the mind of the beholder?? Is it only when the lack of compassion is expressed toward you that you realize there is no more compassion? I guess the answer is obvious. Of course, there is no longer any compassion. The Law has done that to us. The Police State has done that to us. The governments have done that to us. But when a U.S. Senator says it, it makes a difference. Maybe the Pols will eat each other up and then we can get the compassion we need. Let out the druggies from prison would be a good start! "Legalize drugs! Change the tax system! Don't tax dividends and allow corps. to expense them--that would get the stock market moving again! Decontrol! Repeal laws! Reduce the cops power! Etc., etc.

The people behind the Marijuana Factory, which opened on a
quiet suburban Vancouver street, say they are doing
nothing wrong growing marijuana and processing it into potent
pellets for medical use. (10/01/02)
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