Hello. I’m John from down in San Jose. I tend to play free-form jazz with my words, so if I lose you — it’s my fault not yours. I’m quite good at structured, expository writing, but to hell with all that. These days, I just let my brain bounce and play with the cascading cadences [...]

givingThanksI am at times so overwhelmed with profound gratitude that I well up in tears just taking in the colors and shapes that create a marvelous tapestry that we call the world. It is never anything specific that I feel grateful for but rather the world itself. Just to ‘Be’ seems to be the greatest [...]

Friends, I have some news to report. Below is a piece of an instant messenger conversation I am having with my friend Roman in Kiev where election scandals are coming to a head with a right wing (aligned with a group of former soviet states including Russia that are moving that region back toward the cold war) and a progressive candidate who clearly has the support of the people as you can see http://www.1plus1.tv/video/camera.php

http://www.zmag.org/introtopol.htm

I was online this am with a friend in Kiev who shared with me the anger he and his friends are feeling as they see their country pulled away from a leader they know can make a difference in their country. Sounds like some very dubious election behavior. It is in the air…
http://www.kirotv.com/news/3940711/detail.html

Stay agitated!

Until we have built a society that would willingly dismantle the institutions, technologies and processes it has lovingly created � not because they are not in working order or profitable but because they do not contribute to the long term vision and harmony of the planet � we will continue to work blindly toward our destruction.

I’ve been particularly interested in the subject of ‘perspectives’ for the last few months or so. Not by choice but just by recognizing whats been appearing and it just seems that the theme of ‘perspectives’ has been coming up alot for a while now. I think it may have started over the summer when [...]

How many of you have been spending the last few weeks pounding your head against every available wall trying to figure out how so many people could have voted this disingenuous, election-stealing incompetent back into office? What’s the matter with them? Do they not see how sinister and dangerous he is? Are they stupid? Has he really been able to fool 51% of us?

Lately I have been hearing a lot about people wanting to move to Canada or have the blue states secede the nation or something to that effect. But it seems to me that if we simply get back to our roots of being a federation or a ‘republic of states’ than we can remain as [...]

When I would recreate myself, I seek the darkest wood, the thickest and most interminable, and to the citizen, most dismal swamp. I enter a swamp as a sacred place - a sanctum sanctorum. There is the strength, the marrow of Nature. - Henry David Thoreau

Now this is just about the most encouraging thing I have heard. If this is a time of recreating ourselves as Marc suggested in his blog and as Mr. Thoreau points to in this quote - well then I am encouraged.

There will be no end to the troubles of states, or of humanity itself, till philosophers become kings in this world, or till those we now call kings and rulers really and truly become philosophers, and political power and philosophy thus come into the same hands.- Plato

Dear President Bush:

Congratulations on your victory over all us non-evangelicals. Actually,
we’re a bit ticked off here in California, so we’re leaving you.

I live in a very liberal county which is in a conservative state. As a matter of fact, the electoral map of Virginia looks similar to a red eye with a blue pupil right in the middle. This tiny pupil happens to be where I live which is Nelson County and neighboring Albemarle County (home [...]

Groundhogs DayFor the last year or so, I have considered the election of 04 to be, in a sense, like groundhogs day. I say this in the sense that on November 2, 2004, the voters (being the groundhog) would come out and tell us if there was going to be four more years of winter [...]

On the morning of November 2nd I had a short meeting with Angela Davis the radical philosopher and activist and in the evening my heart was breaking from the results of the election. The next day I fell into despair as so many progressives did.

Does everyone notice a theme here? Things are remaining pretty intense for all of us. This weekend I had the privilege to attend a the Green Festival http://www.greenfestivals.com/ that was focused on the revolution at hand.

I want to rush towards optimism - as I always do. And yes in the heart of this experience I do find light � the same light I always find. The light that lives in the hearts of those close to me and connects one to the other in love � so much beauty, so much goodness.

One has to question the nature of change when one sees such things as this. It shapes thoughts about progressive change. It would be interested to see various issues plotted against this map.
http://www.learner.org/biographyofamerica/prog10/maps/

What a dark and dismal day. Forgive me a moment as I try to work toward some hope. I am facing the fact that our world is indeed in the hands of religious extremists on just about every front. The Evangelical Right has gained more ground in this country.