RANDOM JACK

...

american history sweeps a street that won't get clean
I'm carrying a gun carved from snakes and beans
the past tells me the battlefield is not always green
liberty is the highest peak that I have seen

wrapped myself in the flag and went out on the ledge
it took two steps forward to get out over the edge
lovers held out their hands but watched me fall
once I hit purgatory it turned into a serious brawl

I came back to life in the fields of war you see
and I cried to see that others were following me
so I walked off the line and lay my gun to the side
and in the name of peace you know I again died


chorus:

Cessation Blues, let it be one with you
even Gulliver knew, the Cessation Blues


- Chris Mansel

Labels: Mind of Mansel

Olbermann is eloquent as always. And he utilizes a tool that most journalists either do not have or fear to use – a vocabulary. Maybe the words are written by someone else, but regardless, this is proof that intelligent use of the language can of itself be persuasive.

I agree with Olbermann, but that's no surprise. I have always felt that we should seek to collectively try to create a society that is compassionate before all else.

But in a free and open society, we are also free to be subjected to manipulation by those who are greedy to acquire and maintain their hold on power even if it means many others will die, even if it means that they themselves will die sooner than necessary. Power has its own directive. It seeks to consume, to control and drive the whole world to a massive, bloody conclusion merely for the ability to say "I had," "I have," and "I am above all others." It is ego written as large as the universe and once you have tasted even a small portion of it you cannot let it go without personal sacrifice because anything or anyone you believe you have conquered is now a part of you and to lose it means losing something more precious than life in the future, it means losing that part of your self right now. It means a small, immediate death. Once this contagion grips you you will do anything to protect it. That is the contagion, the real disease at the heart of the problem.* Many people – probably a majority now – believe that healthcare reform means that they will lose a part of themselves. This despite the fact that they do not actually possess what it is they are afraid of losing.

Once again we will fail because we prefer to react before we think. The leadership in and out of government, those who will ultimately make the decision about healthcare, has been horrible on all sides and from all corners. No one has spoken directly and clearly about the issue. Olbermann comes as close to it as anyone I have read or heard when he says that the issue comes down to the simple fact - "I want to live." We can make the apparently complex issue much clearer by asking a few questions. Here they are:

Does everyone in this country have the same right to live as everyone else?

If you are rich do you have a greater right to live than if you are poor?

If you are poor is it your obligation to become wealthy enough to pay for health insurance and all other health costs no matter how rapidly those costs continue to rise?

Should we cut healthcare costs by simply eliminating those who cannot afford it from the system? More directly, should we allow the poor to die because they are too poor to afford healthcare?

And how much will the cost of healthcare have to rise before you become one of those who can no longer afford to pay for it and be condemned to death?

Life is precious. The life we have is all we know. But as Olbermann states so eloquently, and as we all know, we all must die. How long do you want to live? Do you want to live as long as you are able to speak and hear and know the world around you? If so, you will need to live healthy and need a reliable system of healthcare to help you return to health when you inevitably fall ill. Do you have that right? If you do, does everyone else as well? Where do you draw the line? In the U.S. it appears that the line will be drawn with dollars. Life will be equated with wealth. The richer you are the longer you live. If that is the choice we make. So be it. We have always had a talent for ignoring the suffering of others with the exception of short term emergencies. Oh, there are those few who will give to the poor or help out in other ways. A few will even dedicate their entire lives to alleviating the suffering of others. But most of us are better at ignoring pain and suffering until it touches us. Then we want it to go away. In short, we want to live.

Do I matter more than you? I don't think that I do. And it doesn't bother me that I have less money in my pocket because someone else who is suffering tonight draws on medicaid or medicare or some other publicly funded program. But those programs are in fact underfunded and medicaid in particular is one reason that healthcare costs continue to rise. Another reason might be that pharmaceutical companies, as a group, spend half their budgets on advertising drugs (most of which cannot be acquired without a prescription). But I am obviously a socialist, right? If you believe that you believe a lie. And I am one of many millions.

Consider the questions and consider how you will feel if you fall on the bad side of the equation.

This is the way I speak to myself when it comes to the issue of healthcare. I am not sure that there is a solution. But can't we at least try to find a way for everyone to live as long as they can or as long as they chose? Maybe the answer is simply to leave things alone and let the system collapse. Maybe a better system will replace it based on supply and demand alone. I doubt it, but I'm beginning to think we're going to find out.

INFNITIES
jk

* Editor's Note: Despite the best efforts of the healthcare industry, the public continues to strongly support healthcare reform in general and the public option in particular. Another way to look at the debate is this: If healthcare is a right and not a privilege then it is immoral to profit by it. The health insurance industry serves no useful purpose to the general public. It should eliminated by the most direct means possible. Further, profit making corporations should not be allowed to own and operate hospitals and healthcare clinics any more than such corporations should be allowed to run schools, fire stations, police forces and the military. We are told to be afraid of government (i.e., socialism) but we ought to be afraid of the corporate takeover that is unfolding before our weary eyes.

Labels: Jake's Word

Date: Oct 15, 2009 5:59 AM
Beatlick Travel Report #12

It has taken a full year to really become comfortable with our new van. I felt so connected to my old 71 VW and transferring emotionally to my newer 77 has been like taking on a new lover. When in Albuquerque last month the transmission hung up on me twice in one day in downtown traffic. I panicked at first then thought this van is officially blessed by the Ukranian Orhtodox Church, me too and Joe. This can’t be happening. The painful learning curve. All this time I have been shifting in a lazy X pattern when I should have been using an H pattern. So now I know and that is last bit of trouble I have had with the van. Coming back from Taos was one of the most pleasant experiences I have had, stress free driving now.

We are also in a new era with Beatlick News. We’ve changed over to a new publishing program, more compatible than our old Quark documents. I also took the front page picture with my Tracphone and emailed it to my new laptop computer, which is Wifi compatible. Publication is becoming much more streamlined and less stressful, too. And the house-sitting gigs are really starting to stack up so no new trips planned until January.

Here are some final thoughts which will be my Live For Art column in our upcoming issue. Check out beatlick.com in about a week or look for a hard copy in the mail if you are a subscriber.

The Red River and Rio Grande come together at the Wild Rivers Recreational Area in New Mexico. Far above at The Junta Point you stand between the two gorges that hold the rivers between their enormous canyon walls. Having trekked down the canyon paths to the confluence and looking up to Junta Point you can barely intellectually grasp how long it took for the rivers to eat through the flat earth further and further down to the canyon floor. Millions and millions of years. There in the midst of all that space and depth I can’t help but ponder how insignificant I am in the context of all the time ensued to create this natural wonder. How little do we matter in the entire scheme of things except to our own selves and those who share this time and space with us. It’s marvelous and frightening.

I marvel at the friends I am still allowed to have. The longer we are on this earth the more we lose: family, friends, neighborhoods, entire worlds and levels of consciousness.

The universe is still expanding, making us even more significant and small. How we treat each other now is the most important thing—in our homes and in the world. Happy Trails

Keep in touch and stay on the Happy Trails...
Beatlick Pamela Hirst

Labels: Beatlicks

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.


By Jack Random


In what Thomas Paine christened The Age of Reason, democracy supplanted the royal monarchy as the government of choice for enlightened nations. There was much discussion in those pivotal times of human advancement concerning the inherent Rights of Man. Borrowing from England’s Magna Carta, the British philosopher John Locke and the French philosophers Jean-Jacque Rousseau and Francois-Marie Arouet (aka Voltaire), Thomas Jefferson immortalized the universal human rights in the Declaration of Independence:

We hold these truths to be self evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.

Many attempts have been made to identify and innumerate the universal Rights of Man but none yet has succeeded in finding a general consensus across the divergent cultures of our planet. Some nations, held back by centuries of tradition and religious belief, have not yet accepted the basic tenets of individual liberty. Others like our own have failed to move beyond the most basic of rights and liberties. Some would say we have done a poor job of ensuring and protecting even those fundamental rights and I would count myself among them.

There is something to be said for the conservative approach to enlightenment. We cannot expect primitive societies governed by witchdoctors and tribal warlords to be transformed into functioning democracies overnight. We cannot expect nations carved in the earth by foreign occupying powers to embrace ideals of governance they have neither discovered nor devised for themselves. All societies must be allowed to evolve according to their own levels of consciousness by their own methods.

But we in America pride ourselves as a bastion of civil liberty. We never tire of proclaiming ourselves leaders of the free world, a shining city on a hill illuminating the way forward for all of humankind. It hardly matters that we have so often failed the test by sponsoring military dictatorships and coups or allowing the disenfranchisement of minority voters to overturn elections, we have an obligation by our own proclamation and self-aggrandizement to forward the cause. We have a responsibility to lead the world because we believe ourselves to be the world’s leader.

Despite our flaws and failures we have often found our way to push forward in critical times not by summoning the lost voices of our founders but by recognizing their substantial shortcomings. Our founders did not acknowledge the rights of women but the nation found a way. Our founders did not recognize the rights of minorities or the poor but succeeding generations righted those wrongs.

It is time we moved forward. It is time we understood once and for always that for every right our founders committed to law they got something wrong. They were profoundly flawed men even if enlightened for their time and we have no obligation to be bound in perpetuity to their shortcomings.

The recent national debate (if it may be called that) has brought to light several of our shortcomings in the fulfillment of human rights. When angry white men bring semi-automatic weapons to political protests it should not escape anyone’s attention that the right to free expression is compromised by anyone who does not agree with the armed protesters. It is not by happenstance that the founders placed the right to bear arms in the context of “a well regulated militia.” They had no intention of validating the spectacle of an armed mob intimidating their fellow citizens.

What are we afraid of: that a subversive element will take over the government? I would suggest that the subversive element is the angry mob itself and that recent history has already recorded the takeover of our government through electoral fraud. But the remedy was and is in the ballot box, not in armed mobs issuing thinly veiled threats before the television screens.

It will take time but we must curtail the right to arm in order to protect the greater right to freedom of expression and freedom from the inevitable violence that will ensue if this trend continues. We must elect officials who are sworn to take no money from the gun lobby that zealously blocks gun control legislation to prevent unstable individuals from purchasing automatic weapons and wielding them in public. We must eventually change the political equation that will not allow anyone to become a Supreme Court justice unless they agree to ignore the language of the second amendment in favor of an unfettered individual right to bear arms. Barring that we must amend the constitution.

The national debate on healthcare reform has brought to the fore the unfulfilled right to decent and affordable medical care for all our citizens. Indeed, all human beings, even those here illegally or as guests, should have the right to medical treatment without fear of penalty or deportation.

America is so far behind the curve on this issue that it alone places us in the second class of nations on the fulfillment of human rights and respect for human dignity. Every American should be ashamed that we alone among industrialized nations fail to ensure universal healthcare to our people. We are so blind to our own interests that we allow an industry that is motivated by profit and profit alone to dictate the terms of so-called “healthcare reform.” The corporate monoliths that provide millions in political contributions and millions more in a public relations offensive summon the uninsured and unhealthy masses to decry real reform as socialism and (unbelievably) fascism and the masses fall in line. It seems not to matter that fully 65% of the people do not buy the corporate propaganda and remain steadfast in supporting the public option as critical to the reform effort, it only matters that the angry mob on the television screen opposes it.

The fault here goes to the heart of our democracy. Quite simply, our elected officials are on the take. Until we succeed in banning corporate contributions from dominating our electoral system, our officials will represent the wealthiest corporations first and spend most of their time trying to deceive the people into believing it is in their interest.

Perhaps they can explain how it is in our interest that international corporations have been granted all the rights of individuals and more while individuals have been denied the most basic right of democracy: the right to vote. If you don’t believe that is possible you should spend a little time reading the landmark Supreme Court decision Bush v. Gore 2000. If the courts were forced to recognize the right to vote they would find it difficult to ignore the massive voter disenfranchisement that allowed George W. Bush to steal two presidential elections.

How can we possibly believe that our president went to war to secure other nation's rights to democracy when we have done so little to protect our own? The election of 2000 should have been the death knell of the Electoral College. Instead it fortified our standing as a second-class democracy. In any other nation the defense of archaic rules to justify the nullification of popular will would have been condemned for what it is: hypocrisy.

Compounding our shame, we have leaders who advance the notion that voting is not a right at all; it is rather a privilege. As a wise man once said: That is not only a lie but a damnable lie. If voting is a privilege then we live in an aristocracy and democracy be damned.

We cannot summon the founders on this one – not unless we want to go back to the days when the right to vote was conditioned on property ownership and neither women nor minorities were in the club. When the Declaration proclaimed, “all men are created equal,” it was a literal exclusion. The founders set up the United States Senate as a surrogate House of Lords to guard against the dangers of democracy. We can no longer defend such notions any more than we can defend slavery or the disenfranchisement of women.

The U.S. Senate has become the obstructionist body that thwarts the will of the people. It not only stands in the way of meaningful healthcare reform; it stands in the way of the advancement of human rights.

It is time we ended the archaic Senate rules that allow forty senators to defeat any major legislation. If they cannot do it or will not then we must elect senators who will. But we cannot find viable candidates for such a regal position who will represent our interests because the cost of a senate seat requires big money – the kind of money that only corporate monoliths can provide.

Here lies the linchpin of this thesis. It is the reason our government is incapable of advancing the rights of humankind. It is the reason we have not secured our right to vote. It is the reason we have not fulfilled the right to healthcare, the right to employment or the right to decent shelter. All our interests as citizens of the nation fall secondary to corporate interests because the largest and most powerful international corporations have a stranglehold on our political process.

They have the money and money rules – even when it has been provided on the public dole from our own pockets.

What we need now is a peaceful revolution, a mass movement, and a cause that supercedes all others. It is a cause that unifies disparate groups because it is simple and appeals to common sense. It would not prevent the election of fools and charlatans to office but it would end corporate dominance of our government overnight.

It is simply this: Only individuals (subject to the limitations set by our legislative bodies) shall be allowed to contribute to political campaigns.

Jazz.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

Labels: Jack Random, Jazzman Chronicles

Date: Sep 26, 2009 11:23 AM

The confluence of the Rio Grande and Red River is at the Wild Rivers Recreation Area where this report originates. The confluence I mentioned earlier on the Low Road to Taos report was actually the Rio Grande and Rio Pueblo confluence.

I also meant to tell you in my last report about all the small black tarantulas that kept crossing the dirt road we took out to Manby Springs. We passed seven in one mile. That was before the weather changed. These little guys knew all about it and were on their way to make new burrows for themselves as they prepared to settle down for the winter.

We are already hunkered down in full winter mode now as we head out for the Wild Rivers Recreation Area on BLM land. We are sleeping on the bottom bunk and lining the interior with the Indian blankets to keep in the warmth from two big candles, an oil lamp, the occasional Coleman heater, and my favorite – a hot water bottle. I carry it around like a baby, call it the “baby” and just am amazed how warm and cozy it makes me feel. I love it.

We have driven about thirty miles from Taos, off the main road, through lots of small communities that seem to be living a much more hard-scrabble life than their counterparts in glamorous downtown Taos. The clouds get bigger, grayer, and more daunting as we head further and further away.

The Montoso campsite is along the rim of the Rio Grande Gorge. The mountains are dark and vast in the background. There is a second gorge beyond our horizon where the Red River is making its way through its own steep canyon walls, heading toward the Rio Grande. It rains on us that night and a subdued atmosphere greets us as we set out on our hike.

We had to walk to the Junta Trail from the van through a path of decimated pines. By the time we got to the gorge overlook there was some sun peeking out of the clouds. We were well suited up, complete with gloves, sweaters, neck scarves, and sporting two walking sticks.

Here two ecological worlds collide at the Junta. High above on the rim where we camp we see grasslands below the big mountain peaks, along with sagebrush, juniper and pinyon trees. Far down below in the shadows at the bottom of the gorge there are towering ponderosa pine, small springs, and lush riparian vegetation. All lay there in shadow most of the day because the canyon walls are so high.

I can't imagine how far it is from the bottom of that gorge where the river runs to the top of those snow capped mountain peaks that greeted us this morning. It is a 1.2 mile hike down to the confluence. The trail is rated “difficult” and it is. We set out on a rocky switch back trail, had to climb down one ladder, take a long series of metal steps clinging to the rock face, then follow the continuous switch back rocky path down to a flatland. The BLM has made a valiant effort to hold back the relentless law of gravity that erodes the steep rock walls, taking out old trails, and necessitating new ones. At the bottom four trails converged into a cross, where we picked up the Junta trail, .4 miles further down an easy dirt path.

Unlike so many other places we have constantly encountered other hikers here, mostly fishermen with their rods in hand. Two couples came by us with ski poles, or I guess hiking poles. I took our two wooden walking sticks and made myself a hiking stick outfit and was amazed how much easier it was to maneauver and traverse across the rocks.

Despite how intimidating the trail looked and how distant the confluence, we made it there in 30 minutes or less. The hiking sticks I think added to the speed. Joe is a billy goat and scampers over rocks. I was definitely going slower than he was before I started using the two sticks.

There were only big boulders where the two rivers came together, no shoreline. The Rio Grande is the larger of the two rivers, neither one of them really daunting, yet the slope of the land and the big rocks created a friction and conflict so strong that a marvelous roar fills your ears and the water is smashing and gushing over stones, with the light dancing through the droplets of water. I found a relatively flat rock, took up a comfortable yoga position and just willed all that raw energy into my own body.

Later with great dexterity we made two sandwiches on our knees; there was no surface to maneuver with. We munched avocado, pepperoni, and cheese sandwiches while we watched the nearby man fishing for trout. Two women sat on rocks keeping him company. The sun went in and out and long logs of gray clouds still dominated the sky.

When Joe pointed out to me the ridge we had to hike back to I was shocked by how far away it looked and figured it would take all afternoon to get there. However surprisingly enough we were back withing an hour and fifteen minutes.

The most devastating shock of this hike is the destruction created by the pine bark beetles. We camped in the bone yard of pine tree skeletons. In my estimation in places a third of the trees are destroyed. Their carcasses so massive in number that it would be impossible to remove them, or burn them, and they devastate the landscape with their blackened limbs like burnt fingers scratching towards deliverance. But there is none.

Happy Trails
Beatlick Pamela

Labels: Beatlicks

Date: Sep 23, 2009 11:45 AM

We spent four days urban camping in Taos alternating between Wal-Mart and Smith's grocery store before we found the public parking lot. Most accommodating with the city bus line right there, too. Taos is wrapping up the "Summer of Love" and I have had a good time interviewing locals about their reactions. Very diversified and some downright controversial. I have a scathing report to pass on later from a local, but I'm still waiting for permission to publish his rant.

Taos is tiny and I'm telling you they roll up the sidewalks at six o'clock around here. The restaurants are closed by nine and there are I think only three bars that are open into the night. The whole focus is the art scene and skiing. The prices are outrageous I think and all the merchandise is high end. We attended an open-mic in the lounge at the historic Taos Inn, but got there late. There was never a sign up sheet or invitation by the guy singing for anyone else to participate. The drinks were $9 apiece so Joe just ordered a $2 cup of tea. It was a great place to people watch. It's obvious who are the wealthy tourists and who are local low-enders. Their faces are lined with hard work and their jeans are stained with dirty feet in worn out sandals.

The lobby itself was magnificent, constructed of old timbers higher that telephone poles called vegas. They held up a mosaic roof of more wood, smaller pieces called latillas. They made a mosaic of great beauty, like some Cistene Chapel made out of logs. Balconied rooms overlooked the lounge and there was a great iron door that opened into the bar. All the walls were old adobe.

A beautiful long-haired redhead sat next to Beatlick Joe so he initiated a conversation with her. Turns out she lives in Gatlinburg and is moving to the tiny little shrine town of Chimayo. She said her name was Jen and she was staying in Santa Fe and had driven up for the day because she loved Taos so much. Her rental car had been broken into into two days before and she was overcome with how much help and support people gave her as she dealt with the problem. Turns out when she was married she lived in Nashville and her ex-husband ran the fancy Stockyard Restaurant downtown. After a few reminiscences about Music City we were discussing the local hot springs.

Before long a single man sitting on a nearby leather sofa joined our conversation. He was from Rhode Island, a real estate evaluator, whatever that means. He was obviously taken with Jen, who never would disclose her last name as she divulged her former careers in radio and the broadcast media world.

Bob turned out to be divorced, came to Taos two or three times a year, and was currently staying in an earth ship house out in what the locals call the "gopher holes." Those are houses made of recycled materials and tires filled with dirt. As Jen used her interviewing skills Bob's answers disclosed more affluency. He had another house in Vermont. The richer he appeared the more animated she became. Soon Bob was ordering a round of those $9 drinks. We had a good time talking to those two and Joe and I speculated if Jen would really drive all the way back to Santa Fe. We all departed when the bar closed at eleven. Jen had a CD of one of her interviews with an important physicist and philosopher back at her car she wanted to give Bob. We speculated whether she would make that long drive back to Santa Fe that night.

It was one of the most social nights we have had with anyone since we came here. The other highlight of our trip was the spectacular hike down to Manby Hot Springs. They are just a few miles out of town, about six miles down a dirt road. Then you park and hike down the Rio Grande Gorge. It was a steep and rocky trail but only took about twenty minutes. Another VW van owner was there with us. We have seen a lot of VW vans in this town.

Our hot springs mate was Stephan, pronounced the European way: stef-fun. I had hoped we would be alone and we had waited most of the afternoon for the parking lot to empty out. But just as we locked up our van Stephan pulled up in his. So I had to soak, in my bathing suit I might add, with Joe and Stephan both naked. But that's the way it's done out here.

Happy Trails
Beatlick Pamela

Labels: Beatlicks

Date: Sep 13, 2009 9:49 AM

[The website beatlick.com is up and running with the current issue of Beatlick News featured. This is now our only website, geocities site is closed down.]


The roosters start crowing at four in the morning. We are camped out in a field in the South Valley at a friend’s farm. The cows are right next door, too. This is really the country with the sounds of the day marking time just like the church bells used to do in the Upper Ninth Ward in New Orleans.

The chickens sound like people quarreling off in a distance or Ninja warriors getting ready to attack. No wonder farmers wake up early, you can’t sleep through the noise. The roosters crow until about ten in the morning and then the cows start up. It is a cacophony all day long. And the night is augmented with the sound of the neighboring dogs.

We always have some sort of audio book to listen to so when the roosters start in the morning I turn on the boom box in the dark, put on my CDs of “Benjamin Franklin,” “The Johnstown Flood,” or Michener’s “Mexico.” That usually gets me through till about seven in the morning.

We stayed out in the field for a week with our tent set up. It attaches to the van’s sliding side door and creates such an accommodating space we are quite comfortable. We spend our time clearing out the weeds in the garden and watering the orchards, strawberries, and raspberries for camping privileges. After a week we got to move into the A-frame adobe guest house and set up until some more money comes in for next month.

We have to climb an eight-foot ladder to go to bed. It's a challenge to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and we do our best to avoid it. Makes climbing down from the top bunk of the van a breeze. Although I am grateful to be indoors; it's so much quieter.

We love the simplicity of the farm, the slower pace, and the daily chores. From this vantage point you would never guess you were so close to a thriving metropolis such as Albuquerque. We head out in another day or two, for some poetry functions in Las Placitas, then on to Taos.

Happy Trails,
Beatlick Pamela

Labels: Beatlicks