Richard’s Holiday Headlines!

HAPPY NEW YEAR! The best I can offer you is what I have found to be true from experience and study over the past year. Hope there’s something you find of value and in any case all the best to you and yours!


“Your Body’s a Toxic Waste Dump!”

Clean up now with these easy tips!

You may be quite satisfied with the way you are, or perhaps you’ve tried, but having slipped back on more than one attempt, find it futile try again as I did for many a year. But if you’d like to try again I offer these tips, which I GUARANTEE will show immediate benefits. Then, upon seeing and feeling results of more energy, less weight and higher spirits you may be emboldened to stay the course! What I most enjoy are the beaming replies from those who actually tried these tips and saw immediate success. Again, I GUARANTEE you quick and positive results!

A) AVOID like the plague these toxins:

1) ASPARTAME (Nutrasweet, Equal) and Sucralose (Splenda). They affect your neurology AND make you GAIN weight! Quit all DIET DRINKS, SUGARLESS GUM and the like and I GUARANTEE you will feel better, lose weight and have more energy…WITHIN ONE WEEK!

2) TRANS FATS—anything with hydrogenated or “partially hydrogenated” oils. Regular peanut butter, crackers, tons of processed foods and most restaurant food have it. This stuff stays in your body, makes you fat and lethargic and clogs your arteries. READ LABELS, ask restaurants and popcorn makers what oil they are using. For years I had heard of the dangers of “trans fats” but assumed they were overblown and in any case found the foods worth the risk. But after discontinuing them I can tell you that I miss them not in the least!

B) REPLACE the above with whole foods—foods with as little processing as possible. The book “Eat right for your Blood Type” lists foods that are beneficial, neutral and harmful for you depending on your blood type. I circled the beneficial ones THAT I LIKE and try to avoid those in the harmful category. So peanuts, broccoli, grapefruit, soy products, spelt flour are beneficial and I happen to love them. Coffee and Maker’s are on the avoid list, but alas, I consume them too! (Is this what the saying “it’s all good” refers to?)

The key is to EAT HEALTHY FOODS THAT YOU LIKE and eat them in abundance!! For instance, I eat 8 ounces of nuts a DAY**, but I also gave up ALL MEAT (beef, chicken, pork, fish) so I get my protein from nuts. Forget about healthy foods you don’t like, there’s plenty that you do or will enjoy eating.

I felt as though my body was a toxic waste dump before I gave up these poisons. I had the “aspartame puff” of fat on every inch of my body, even though I ran 2 miles a day. Within 2 weeks of this dietary change I saw results and 5 months later had lost 35 pounds.

“Plant Fat Good, Animal BAD”


**REMEMBER—PLANT FAT IS NOT THE DANGER—ANIMAL FAT AND TRANS FATS are the KILLERS!

TO REDUCE DEPENDENCE ON DIET DRINKS—
Dilute half a can of REGULAR Coke e.g. with half a can of COLD carbonated water. Unless you are a diabetic you are much better off with sugared drinks than the Nutrasweet or Splenda ones. BEST of all, just drink WATER, or TEA. If you must use sweeteners, try STEVIA, or turbinado sugar, even molasses or honey.

D) MYTHBUSTERS:

1) Eating late at night is NOT a problem. If really doesn’t matter when you eat, weight gain is more dependant on DAILY TOTAL CALORIC INTAKE. Thus, to LOSE WEIGHT, 1) AVOID the above toxins AND 2) keep calories under 1500 per day. To maintain weight eat 2000 calories with moderate exercise (walking 2 miles/day).

2) Low carb diets mean STARCHY carbs, highly refined flour, breads and potatoes, not fruits and veggies. However, as my own very high starchy carb (WHOLE GRAINS ONLY, however) can attest to, you need not sacrifice starchy carbs to lose weight!

I think these Atkins-type diets are harmful for the long term and ultimately will fail you. If you stay off the toxins above, keep your calories under 2000 a day and exercise a little—just walk a mile or two a day—you will not gain weight, you will have more energy and feel much, much better—I GUARANTEE IT!

3) Fat is NOT bad (see above), but any animal or manufactured fat (trans fats) ARE bad. I gave up all meat, and truly don’t miss it at all. I feel better, NEVER have indigestion AND I don’t have to take a cholesterol pill anymore. But you need not give up meat if you at least give up trans fats and artificial sweeteners, just cut back. Of course with anything other than organic chicken you are also ingesting tons of hormones and possibly a fowl with the built up neurosis of living its whole short life literally on top of and beneath THOUSANDS of its other defecating, pecking brethren in wire cages. Y-C-C-H-H-H!


“Soy & Spelt & Rye—OH MY!”
“and God said, Look! I have given every seed-bearing plant and fruit tree for your food.” Gen 1:29

[NOTE: This biblical verse is just a coincidence, NOT the reason for my food choices]


E) MY FAVORITE FOODS: (a partial list)

1) Sprouted SPELT bread, double toasted, one slice slathered with VEGENAISE (made with grapeseed oil, brown rice syrup and apple cider vinegar it tastes better than mayo and NO CHOLESTEROL!) and mustard then topped with soy bologna or ham, maple flavored eaten like a slice of pizza—this is the best, simplest food that brings me more pleasure than the finest meals out that I have ever eaten.
2) Indian buffets—vegetable masalas, sag (creamed spinach dish)
3) Middle Eastern buffets—tabouli, hummus, baba, mjadara (a lentil dish)
4) Tofu based salads, either curried or Greek salad style—from Good Foods co-op, Lexington
5) Chopped broccoli, cauliflower, green/red pepper and cabbage salad, with vegenaise and/or oil and vinegar –from Good Foods Co-op.
6) Celentano brand frozen eggplant parmegiana vegan (no dairy or meat).
7) Green Guru brand frozen Indian tofu maneer
8) Morningstar or Boca veggie burgers
9) Many fruits and veggies especially apples, grapefruit, cucumbers, mini-carrots, raisins
10) NUTS about nuts—peanuts, cashews especially. The BEST that I’ve found: peanuts-Planters, dry roasted, lightly salted 20oz for under $3; cashews-Planters 21 oz WHOLE cashews for $6.99 AT TARGET, the best quality and most for your money cashews you will find! Forget cashew “halves and pieces” as they don’t taste the same as whole.
11) PLANTER’S trail nut mix “Nuts & Raisins” you can find at Walgreen’s or Rite-Aids. THESE ARE AWESOME!
12) Mini carrots with hummus drizzled in olive oil and paprika
13) CEREAL MIX: Health Valley Oat bran flakes cereal, Uncle Sam’s with mixed berries, Bulk granolas and messily from Wild Oats—ALL WITH SILK BRAND UNSWEETENED SOYMILK—I GUARANTEE you will like this better than milk. Remember—cows wean their young OFF their milk when they reach a certain age, so why do WE continue drinking milk long past childhood? Oatmeal is great as well.


ONE FOR THE ROAD--- Meditative WALKS are great for your body and mind. Just think about NOTHING, and concentrate on your breath—the feeling against your nose when you inhale and exhale as you walk THINKING ABOUT NOTHING. Find a park if you can, but walk like this for 30 minutes. It’s the best thing you can do FOR YOU!

“Flyboys—Movie of the Year!”

ENTERTAINMENT:

A. MOVIES—the sleeper great movie of the year is FLYBOYS, set in France during WWI. I tell you, the storyline and dialogue is perfect, no superfluous or forced dialogue, phenomenal cinematography, great acting from unknowns, heartwarming, tragic and uplifting---SEE IT!

MY uncle Willie can be seen clearly ushering Bobby Kennedy around Eastern Kentucky in BOBBY, a good movie in its own right.

B) SHOPPING

I get a kick just viewing all the goods out there and analyzing just HOW they came to be. From conception, to design and execution each and every product is a culmination of lots of people from lots of lands, all made possible by the progression of each human generation standing on the shoulders of the one that preceded it. What we get for what we pay is so very great indeed if you really think about it!

QUESTION OF THE YEAR: “IS THE EARTH WITH EVERYTHING ON THE SAME WEIGHT AS IT WAS THOUSANDS/MILLIONS/BILLIONS YEARS AGO, OR HEAVIER OR LIGHTER?”



PET PEAVES:

A. WEATHER REPORTING—I like it cool, thus I immediately change the dial when the weather people wax on about “o-o-o-o-h, it’s going to drop down to 40, but then it will turn better, warming up to near 70! 70 degrees is better…IN DECEMBER?! No way. All they ever like reporting is warm, rising temperatures and sunny skies, but let it hit 90 for a month straight without rain, then they START to sing a different tune. They should do as Joe Friday on Dragnet—just give us the facts, DON’T EDITORIALIZE!!! We can determine if we like what’s here or coming, they have no business making our judgments for us. I don’t bother with weather anymore, I get it online or not at all—it’s here like it or not!


B. INCONSIDERATE DRIVERS (like me, although less than I used to be as I am more conscious about it). You know, you’ll be driving down a thoroughfare and a car/SUV at the side street will zoom out darn near right in front of your approach!! Then as you slam the brakes you’ll note them gunning at full blast as if to say, “see, there was plenty of room for me to go.” As I say, I’ve done it too. Not using use turn signals is another annoyance.

C. Undue adulation for athletes or any human: Fireworks and circus histrionics at UK games are annoying and counterproductive. Indoors, the smoke may in fact be harmful, but for me and those around me it is certainly annoying. And showering such adulation on any human, much less young men who are playing a game, is plain inappropriate. Oh, and it doesn’t help at all in their performance as UK has lost more home games than ever the last few years since they’ve instituted these shenanigans.

D. Disease inventing OR inducing DRUG CO. COMMERCIALS!

The typical ad: “Suffering from smockeroporitis? Try Saforu—it works!” Visual: Middle aged couple in slow motion walking amidst blooming cherry trees, hand in hand, she cupping the back of his head as he looks in her eyes with a contented smile, Big Chill music in background. Then the last 80% of the commercial with THESE warnings: “Don’t take Saforu if you’re menstruating, taking vitamins, supplements, aspirin, grapefruit juice, broccoli or Sanka or doing lawn work. In any case Saforu may cause shortness of breath, rheumatism, lockjaw or mild stroke-like symptoms.” Ending--CLOSE-UP VISUAL of Couples kissing, “Ask your doctor if Saforu is right for you!”

My favorite is the Cialis commercial that ends with “if you experience an erection for more than 4 hours call your doctor immediately.” YEAH, RIGHT! Heck, I’m calling my buds, every girl I’ve ever known—especially those single and in the immediate vicinity--but no way I’m calling’ a doc!

“Mother God, Comfort us”

NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION NUMBER ONE is to see more of God’s reality. And since God is all, God is woman as much as man, yet I have always said and envisioned God as Him. I will now endeavor to envision God as Mother. While still a mystery, my hope is God will help me get a little closer to the Her truth.

Anyway, I am a very lucky guy. I appreciate your friendship and look forward to the new friends I’ll make in the coming year.

HAPPY NEW YEAR! RFD 12/31/06

Jesus, Mary and Joseph—illegal immigrants in the land of Egypt

Immigration controversy during Christmas seems so out of place. After all it is the season we celebrate the birth of Jesus, whose very life defined charity, mercy and love. Yet the timing could not be better for there are parallels between the nativity story and today’s hottest issue that can enlighten our path.

You see, Joseph, Mary and Jesus were themselves immigrants. They fled to Egypt to escape the murderous clutch of King Herod, who was looking to kill baby Jesus, the newborn king about whom the wise men had spoken.

This begs the question: What if the Egyptians had treated Jesus like some would today’s immigrants who are here without proper authorization? They’d have sent them packing back to Bethlehem, in Judea, where Herod would have killed him.

Never would we have known about Jesus, God’s shining example of how we should order our lives. No Prince of Peace, no shepherds or silent nights, no peace on earth, good will to men. No reason and thus, no season.

Earth would be a more hard-hearted orb, one with less mercy, less justice and no concept of forgiveness, redemption and eternal life. And while ages upon ages of human-caused misery attest to the distance we still have to go it would have undoubtedly been even farther without Jesus’ leadership.

This is not to minimize or ignore the problems associated with newcomers to our country, documented or not. Yet they also contribute mightily to the ever-growing quilt of America. The good far outweighs the downside. And after all, if you were drowning and about to be saved by an immigrant, would you stop and ask to see their papers?

Surely we can fashion policies consistent with Jesusian principles, chief among them the precedence of the Golden Rule over any man-made political boundaries. Steps along this higher path might include some of the following:

1) A guest worker program,
2) A requirement for employers of undocumented workers to enlist them in this program, collect payroll taxes and otherwise pay and treat them as our law demands for citizens;
3) A track to citizenship for those working and obeying our laws, including education and indoctrination on the rights and responsibilities of living in America;
4) Bi-lingual education only as a means to learning English.

We are able to celebrate God’s greatest gift because of the welcome reception given Jesus by the Egyptians. We can do Jesus no greater honor than to similarly treat the newcomers in our midst.

And by so acting with the faith we profess we will fulfill the true spirit of Christmas.

Richard F. Dawahare 12/5/06

The Assassination of America

I must share the flood of emotions upon seeing “Bobby” today, the movie about Robert F. Kennedy and the day he was assassinated. First, there was the image from my youth of the Kennedy brothers, the very embodiment of humanity’s ideal. My Uncle Willie, the mayor of Hazard (and a proud Republican, but NOT in today’s ideological sense of partisanship, see below), in addition to teaching me about Churchill, Roosevelt and Khrushchev gave me a commemorative coin stamped with JFK’s “Ask not what your country can do for you, rather what you can do for your country.”

Then November 22, 1963. The third grade teacher was called away then came back crying and told us we’d be going home early as President Kennedy was shot. It was a cold, gray late fall day, the kind all such seasonal days were back then, before we ever heard of “global warming.” The neighbor boy and I would feign shots at one another in our front yard, keeling backwards as we shouted “SPY!” My parents were visibly upset, but as kids we did not sense the utter destruction of hope, of purity of thought and purpose that was to befall the idealist followers and believers of JFK’s mighty vision.

That Christmas came, and a few more, before the full fruits of a disillusioned generation blazed its way across the TV screen and headlines. Pinko protestin’ hippies, all of em drugged out on LSD or marijuana were, in my mind, evil, bad, the antithesis of “apple pie and Chevrolet.”

I had heard something about another Kennedy, Bobby, who was running for President. I had little inkling then of all that he stood for: a nation united by compassion, charity and justice. The morning of the first day of summer vacation my parents had a shocked glaze as they came out of their bedroom: young Bobby’d been shot, shot by someone called Sirhan Sirhan, which seemed then and seems even now so surreal.

The movie brought all this back to me, but then something truly awoke me. UNCLE WILLIE! As mayor of Hazard he ushered Bobby around the Eastern Kentucky’s coal fields, meeting the poorest of America’s poor, so Bobby could see first hand Appalachian poverty. There he was in the actual footage, with his brown hat and thick black glasses of the day Uncle Willie hosting Bobby Kennedy, which was old news to me as I’ve seen the black and white photo Uncle Willie was always so proud of. http://www.communityarts.net/readingroom/archivefiles/2004/08/when_kennedy_ca.php

The thing is this: compassion, the idea of using tax dollars, our pooled resources, to alleviate others’ suffering is neither a Democratic one nor a Republican one. My uncles, my dad, all favored such action, and they represented both parties. Politics back then was more gamesmanship than the ideological fight (to the political death) end that it has become today.

Hope died that June day with Bobby’s death and America has never truly recovered. It is partly why we are constantly wondering how we drifted away from what we wistfully recall as the good ol’ days, when there was honor, modesty and deference—to the government and to each other.

Instead we’ve allowed the airwaves to be as polluted as our skies with trashy programming and even trashier, and evermore dishonest, so-called news and comment shows. Irreverence is the new standard in entertainment, in news reporting, and in politics. We flail about helplessly, unable to stop our slide down the slippery slope of self-justification that has made us sacrifice any claim America once had to moral leadership.

Decent Americans feel it and see it yet feel powerless to change this sense of hopelessness that has its roots in those Kennedy assassinations. We still see no way out.

Worse, we’ve mostly stopped searching.

Rfd 12/17/06

Used to Be

Used to be I shunned my shoes. But pointed mom to a man with no feet and then I had no further blues.

Used to be I’d eat this and skip that and often whine if it wasn’t just right. Then one day my dad would say, about the scraps I’d thrown away, “what a feast they would be for the many hungry who have nothing to eat but misery” and now each morsel is as dear as can be.

Used to be I’d give thanks for my food and eating to fill sit contentedly still. Then I’d see folks for whom chew was a chore, while for others digestion was for them very sore. So now I am thankful for each bite I take, every swallow I make and for flow-thrus that go just as easy as cake.

Used to be I’d be nimble and quick, move to and fro with no thought to this trick. Then I’d meet people who hobbled about, some with game knees, bad hips, goiter or gout. Now I’m so thankful just to walk in the park with a gait free and easy and pain be without.

Used to be couples I met who divorced, I’d feel sorry for both and had great remorse. But having gone through a similar course—and one I never ever dreamed I would source!—I know how important that empathy is. Even more so did my faith in God grow, and stronger it grew as God carried me through. And while teaching me how very little I knew, that though She/He be a complete mystery, all I need do is believe in what’s good and, too, in what’s true.

Used to be my eternity depended upon the Holy Trinity. Yet to put God in a box built by men orthodox that over the ages became petrified thought denies a reality that lets God be what God is which is all that we see and all that we don’t and even, too, all that we won’t.

Used to be “In the beginning there was the Word.”

Now words just get in the way.

Rfd 11/25/06

A Solution for Iraq, A Second Chance for Bush

It’s over. Yet it’s just beginning, a seed of hope that could sprout both a new chance for peace and a salvation of President Bush and his stature in history.

His recent conciliation and expressions of desire to work with the new Democratic leadership is a 180 degree turn from 6 years of bull-headed charges in the wrong direction, a course which has lead to fear and loathing throughout the world, and drapes-pulled-from-the-eyes discontent at home.

If, as his recent stance seems to indicate, his attitude is truly changed, he can retire in two years with a shiny epitaph and restored reputation as a human who erred, yet for the good of humanity, did all he could to right it. Here’s how.

The world is ready. They have renewed confidence in the American public that we too have seen the error of our unilateral and dangerous aggression and want to re-join the community of nations in the quest for shared security and well being for all countries, not just the U.S.

Therefore, they will gladly work with us in bringing peace to Iraq and the region. But President Bush must actively seek and sincerely want their partnership. He must not merely accept, but honestly insist on other nations’ best and equal involvement in solving the quagmire, asking only that any such nation be in it for the right reasons: the welfare of Iraq, the region and the world at large, and not just for what they stand to gain.

This seemed all but impossible before the President’s post-election speeches and firing of Donald Rumsfeld. But such is his power that even with a Democratically controlled Congress it is his demeanor and actions that can continue to break or instead repair us.

With the holidays nearing an analogy to Dickens’ A Christmas Carol seems appropriate. As the ghost of Christmas Future ushers us about we see the world as it will look a few years hence if the present course remains unaltered. Headlines of death, despair and contempt, a presidency ranked at the bottom, President Bush a tragic example of what one should never to be.

Yet, behold! This is a nightmare vision of what might happen. And like the joyful Scrooge upon the discovery that he still COULD change the future, George W. Bush has a second chance. Tomorrow’s headlines full of hope, peace and progress. President Bush, smiling from the cover of his new best seller, “From My War to Our Peace, a Tale of Grace and Redemption,” his legacy secure in the annals of history.

It is possible and it is doable. President Bush need only act with the faith he so proudly professes and with humility and magnanimity face the mistakes of the past to insure a more hopeful tomorrow.

And in a well-deserved glow of contentment he can end his farewell speech not with “God bless America,” but rather “God bless the world!”

Richard F. Dawahare 11/10/06

When a Rose is not a Rose

The biggest news today is not related to the election. No. It is instead a story about the state of New York legally recognizing that black indeed may be white, that up can be in fact down! Specifically New York is moving forward with a plan to allow people to change the sex on their birth certificate upon affidavits from a doctor and mental health professional laying out why their patient should be considered a member of the opposite sex and asserting that the proposed change would be permanent.

Cool.

Applicants would have to have changed their names and lived in their new gender for at least two years, but there is no requirement for any surgical operation, which is considered arbitrary. “It’s the permanence of the transition that matters most,” says Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, New York City’s health commissioner.

This “recognizes the emerging shift away from viewing gender as simply the sum of one’s body parts.” (Quoting Damien Cave, the NY Times writer of this story, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/07/nyregion/07gender.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print).

Joann Prinzivalli, 52, a lawyer for the New York Transgender Rights Organization is a human born as a male, but living as a woman since 2000 without surgery said this is a progressive move away from American culture’s misguided fixation on genitals as the basis for one’s identity.

“It’s based on an arbitrary distinction that says there are two and only two sexes,” she said. “In reality the diversity of nature is such that there are more than just two, and people who seem to belong to one of the designated sexes may really belong to the other.”

Okay, value judgment time. Since love should be the guiding rule for all humanity, I will look at it through the eyes of that highest of values. Doing so I say, “GREAT, FANTASTIC, AWESOME!” Undoubtedly there are folks dancing to the tune of a different drummer than the storybook band that convention has decreed as being the only one suitable for the dances similarly dictated as acceptable.

These human souls long for the freedom to be themselves, thereby attaining a peace of mind that we all require to live happily, and by extension, to help others live happily as well. It just makes for a better world.

This recognition, radical and revolutionary to be sure, is for me another sign of God’s mystery. Today’s “Truth” is more than what I thought it was yesterday, and certainly—hopefully--not as full as it will be tomorrow.

Rebuttals to Vote Rigging Charge or Let Jimmy Carter Stay home

I am lucky to have many intelligent friends across the political spectrum. Some have given a different perspective than the one I presented regarding the unreliability of electronic, paperless voting machines. I list them verbatim below.

I believe they each have merit and admit that I truly do not know the level, if any, of fraud that actually exists. I am convinced, however, that the potential for fraud is more than has ever existed with old fashioned paper ballots.


1) There are safeguards. Your a bit overzealous.


2) If these accusations are true, then people should be in prison.


3) We have had electronic voting machines for almostthirty years. There has not been one case of provenvoting fraud with these machines. I know we do havethe Rev. "Mr. "shakedown Jesse Jackson, stating everyelection cycle .. Fraud .. Fraud. I find itinteresting he has not been successful with anydisenfranchisement suit. However, I would argue that voting fraud is not arepublican issue. It is a democratic and republicanissue. We have had cases in New York in the lastelection cycle that 77,000 dead people voted. Additionally, how about states like Maryland who countabsentee votes two days after the polls close. Or,how about election fraud issues in high populatedareas by which senior folks homes and people withAlzheimer's are targeted. I think these are the casesthat we need to expose.

4) I thought the entire point of using electronic voting machines was to cut down on fraud. It was long alleged that paper ballot elections were easily rigged with mountains of fraudulent ballots; now it is said that electronic ballots are easily manipulated. I find it hard to believe that the Democratic Party would stand idly by and do nothing if they thought that a particular election was rigged.

This Election, Send Jimmy Carter to… America!

Can you just imagine the chief executive of the main paperless electronic voting machine maker say, “(I am) committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year.”? You don’t have to imagine. It happened!

Walden O’Dell, then Diebold CEO made the prophetic guarantee in an August 2003 fundraising letter. Can you imagine what Republicans or their mouthpieces like Rush Limbaugh would say if that CEO were a Democrat speaking of a sitting Democratic president?

Yet, the multitudinous tales of election mayhem by Diebold from California, Georgia, Maryland, Florida, Minnesota, Ohio and most if not every state continues unabated. Election fraud will happen this fall and without a paper trail it will be nearly impossible to prove it.

There is a guiding rule for public servants and those dealing with them: one must not engage in an activity or accept, or give, a benefit if there is even the appearance of impropriety. This rule has been utterly trashed, and instead its opposite now rules the hearts and minds of our top so-called leaders. But in the voting machine scandals it is not just the appearance, but also the actuality of an ongoing impropriety.

The wolf is not merely guarding the henhouse—the wolf now owns it while we scuttle like lambs from one non-story to another allowing this outrage continue.

Three of the four voting machine makers are major Republican supporters. Chuck Hagel was chairman of ES&S, the voting machine maker that tallied 85% of Nebraska’s votes in his 1996 election to the Senate, the first Republican in 24 years to win that seat.

There are many reports of computer patches, code swapping and hacked manipulations. Just last week Maryland governor Robert Ehrlich, Jr., a Republican running for re-election, said that the voting situation is "approaching crisis proportions." He advised voters to vote with absentee ballots. "I don't care if we paid half a billion dollars or $1 billion," Ehrlich said. "If it's going to put the election at risk, there's no price tag for a phony election or a fraudulent election."

A former Diebold employee-turned-whistleblower, Chris Hood, recounts how in 2002 Diebold, though it was the highest of nine bids, got the Georgia contract for voting machines, and how Georgia essentially delegated the whole voting apparatus to them. He said Diebold employees altered 5000 voting machines (he personally did 56 and witnessed 1200) in the heavily Democratic DeKalb and Fulton Counties with a patch—a programmable memory card that can skew an election to any desired result. Small wonder that though the poles showed Democrats Max Cleland and Roy Barnes ahead six days before the election, both lost narrowly. [Max Cleland, you may recall, was the triple amputee Vietnam War vet who was viciously and fraudulently painted as a traitorous chicken by Republican Saxby Chambliss.]

Beyond the obvious corruption and unaccountability of paperless, ostensibly Republican-run, voting machines is the GOP’s systematic dis-enfranchisement of registered voters. Kenneth Blackwell, Ohio’s ultra-partisan GOP secretary of state oversaw the purging of over 300,000 names in heavily Democratic precincts of Cleveland, Cincinnati and Toledo. Not surprisingly there were 50,000 complaints of dis-enfranchised voters following the election. Long lines up to 6 hours, in poorer Democratic precincts discouraged many still on the rolls from casting their ballots.

The United States is one of the very few democracies that allow private companies to run the voting of nations electorate. Just four such companies will secretly tabulate over 80% of Americans’ votes using their own proprietary software with no reliable checks or balances.

Regardless of party affiliation, we should all protest the further use of paperless, electronic voting machines, which without the safeguard of a verifiable paper trail, leave them easily subject to manipulation and fraud.

Equally, we should reject any and all attempts to discourage voting. Such dis-enfranchisement is the hallmark of fascist, totalitarian states, not the world’s supposedly truest democracy.

So instead of sending Jimmy Carter to some far off third world country to promote free and fair elections let’s send him somewhere closer to home. Let’s send him to America.

Richard F. Dawahare, 11/2/06

Kevin Tillman, Pat's brother and fellow soldier: Cauldron of Truth. Bless him!

Kevin Tillman, brother of the late Pat Tillman and fellow soldier in the Iraq war, writes the most truthful and powerful indictment of that folly that I have seen. His courage and leadership are what may yet save America and its democracy....


After Pat's Birthday

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/200601019_after_pats_birthday/

Posted on Oct 19, 2006

By Kevin Tillman

Editor's note: Kevin Tillman joined the Army with his brother Pat in 2002, and they served together in Iraq and Afghanistan. Pat was killed in Afghanistan on April 22, 2004. Kevin, who was discharged in 2005, has written a powerful, must-read document.
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It is Pat's birthday on November 6, and elections are the day after. It gets me thinking about a conversation I had with Pat before we joined the military. He spoke about the risks with signing the papers. How once we committed, we were at the mercy of the American leadership and the American people. How we could be thrown in a direction not of our volition. How fighting as a soldier would leave us without a voice. until we got out.

Much has happened since we handed over our voice:

Somehow we were sent to invade a nation because it was a direct threat to the American people, or to the world, or harbored terrorists, or was involved in the September 11 attacks, or received weapons-grade uranium from Niger, or had mobile weapons labs, or WMD, or had a need to be liberated, or we needed to establish a democracy, or stop an insurgency, or stop a civil war we created that can't be called a civil war even though it is. Something like that.

Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is.

Somehow our elected leaders were subverting international law and humanity by setting up secret prisons around the world, secretly kidnapping people, secretly holding them indefinitely, secretly not charging them with anything, secretly torturing them.

Somehow that overt policy of torture became the fault of a few "bad apples" in the military.

Somehow back at home, support for the soldiers meant having a five-year-old kindergartener scribble a picture with crayons and send it overseas, or slapping stickers on cars, or lobbying Congress for an extra pad in a helmet. It's interesting that a soldier on his third or fourth tour should care about a drawing from a five-year-old; or a faded sticker on a car as his friends die around him; or an extra pad in a helmet, as if it will protect him when an IED throws his vehicle 50 feet into the air as his body comes apart and his skin melts to the seat.

Somehow the more soldiers that die, the more legitimate the illegal invasion becomes.

Somehow American leadership, whose only credit is lying to its people and illegally invading a nation, has been allowed to steal the courage, virtue and honor of its soldiers on the ground.

Somehow those afraid to fight an illegal invasion decades ago are allowed to send soldiers to die for an illegal invasion they started.

Somehow faking character, virtue and strength is tolerated.

Somehow profiting from tragedy and horror is tolerated.

Somehow the death of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people is tolerated.

Somehow subversion of the Bill of Rights and The Constitution is tolerated.

Somehow suspension of Habeas Corpus is supposed to keep this country safe.

Somehow torture is tolerated.

Somehow lying is tolerated.

Somehow reason is being discarded for faith, dogma, and nonsense.

Somehow American leadership managed to create a more dangerous world.

Somehow a narrative is more important than reality.

Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is.

Somehow the most reasonable, trusted and respected country in the world has become one of the most irrational, belligerent, feared, and distrusted countries in the world.

Somehow being politically informed, diligent, and skeptical has been replaced by apathy through active ignorance.

Somehow the same incompetent, narcissistic, virtueless, vacuous, malicious criminals are still in charge of this country.

Somehow this is tolerated.

Somehow nobody is accountable for this.

In a democracy, the policy of the leaders is the policy of the people. So don't be shocked when our grandkids bury much of this generation as traitors to the nation, to the world and to humanity. Most likely, they will come to know that "somehow" was nurtured by fear, insecurity and indifference, leaving the country vulnerable to unchecked, unchallenged parasites.

Luckily this country is still a democracy. People still have a voice. People still can take action. It can start after Pat's birthday.

Brother and Friend of Pat Tillman,
Kevin Tillman

An Ode to the Axle, the Cello and Hugh Masekela

I was enjoying a beautiful Bluegrass ride through the rolling hills of central Kentucky after a day of watching fast women and pretty horses Keeneland when James Taylor’s classic Fire and Rain blared forth. With it came memories of my sophomore year at Lafayette High: football Friday’s and first dates, crisp cold gray days with the multi-hued leaves filling the streets and lawns.

But what makes this such a powerful song? Certainly, there’s James himself, the author and creator. But I submit to you that there is so much more. Whoever planned the cello part was pure genius. Whoever played that cello did so to perfection. Whoever arranged the song and produced it did so flawlessly. And whoever engineered the sound, thereby creating the final product was at the top of their game.

Like any musical recording, it is ALL these working in tandem that creates the tunes so familiarly fabulous to our ears. That cello in Fire and Rain is so powerful that the song could never be the same without it.

Same with Hugh Masekela’s trumpet in the Byrd’s “So You Want to be a Rock and Roll Star.” The song is hypnotic, but it is Hugh’s horn that makes it a heavenly harmony. It soars!

This all reminded me of the axle, that forgotten but essential part without which the wheel would be useless. The wheel gets all the credit as the greatest invention of all time, but where would it be without the humble axle.

Look behind the “stars” of your world. You’ll find a million such axles, cellos and Hughs.


RFD 10/18/06

Unholy Hoax: The "Clash of Civilizations"

The best lie contains elements of truth, thus making it devilishly difficult to expose. So it is with today’s biggest lie: that “Islamic fascists” are bringing on a “clash of civilizations” to take over the world.

The truthful elements are obvious. There have been many acts and statements of violence in the name of Islam by rogue extremists. 9/11 happened and is attributed to this group, who, it is claimed “hate us for our freedoms” and want to destroy us. That image is further tarnished by their seeming intolerance of free speech, most recently shown by their demonstrations in the wake of the Pope’s speech.

Yet, the larger truth is that all such words and actions are but from a very small number of the Muslim world. They do not speak for mainstream Islam. In fact, most Muslims view such extremist terrorists for what they are: criminals. For example, Sheik Fassa al-Guood, an Iraqi Sunni tribal leader is leading a force of 20,000 men to “purge (Ramadi) of these infidels.” He continued, “People are fed up with the acts of those criminals who take Islam as a cover for their crimes.”

Exactly. The 9/11 perpetrators were criminals. Suicide and subway bombers are criminals. As the Sheik correctly noted, they use Islam as a cover. So why are our leaders falling for this bait and actively encouraging an onset of this clash?

One possibility is that they need a foil to serve as a scapegoat against which they can unleash their “solution”: a new era of military domination as outlined in uncanny detail in the Project For A New American Century, PNAC, which you can read online. In it you’ll find that the war in Iraq was planned long before 9/11, that they predicted a “new Pearl Harbor” event so as to convince Americans of the need to vastly increase the military and that our future, if this plan is allowed to continue, will put us on a course of perpetual conflict.

It is far better to deal with terrorists as the criminals that they are, than to create a clash that need not be.

Democracy’s Seven Deadly Sins

“Democracy.” We hear a lot of talk about this all-defining concept. It is the magic elixir for the world’s political ills. Politicians brandish the term as they would a crucifix before a vampire often coating their actions with the honey of “Democracy” in order to win our support.

Yet true Democracy is often different than what we are led to believe, so it behooves us to better understand this most American of our ideals.

To best define something, in this case Democracy, it is helpful to look at its polar opposite, what it is not. “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich,” which I have been devouring the past two months is a divinely ordained wake up call in this respect. In it we learn, by negative experience, the essential elements of a true democracy. That is, since Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler represented the polar opposite of a free democracy, by studying the characteristics of this most fascist of states we can more clearly appreciate what defines our free democracy, and be better able to follow it.

First, the hallmarks of Hitlerian fascism:

1) A populace made subservient by catastrophe and fear;

2) Political leadership more focused on personal gain and/or special interests than the greater public interest;

3) Concentration of power, without the safeguard of checks and balances, in the head of state; who had

4) A powerful military made accountable to that head instead of to the people; and who also had

5) Control of the airwaves that enabled the constant broadcast of false information; and who

6) Gave total priority to corporate interests over those of workers and lower classes; and who

7) Eliminated dissent through intimidation and brutal force, and the fomenting of public opinion against critics of the head of state through appeals to nationalism and patriotism.

These are the Seven Deadly Sins for not only democracy but for all free, communal societies. Now let’s look at the corresponding polar opposites for each of these traits in truly free democracies:

1) A populace with faith--in their country, in each other and in their government;

2) Political leaders, fairly elected and solely focused on the greater public interest;

3) Shared political power with safeguarding checks and balances on the head of state;

4) A powerful military answerable to the citizens through their elected representation;

5) Open airwaves, treated as the public franchise they are, where divergent viewpoints are given equal time;

6) Workers’ interests are equal to those of the corporations;

7) Encouragement of comment and criticism as a patriotic act.



Remarkably, a perfect example occurred as I was writing this. George Bush gave his speech calling for Congress to pass his military tribunal legislation so “…the men our intelligence officials believe orchestrated the deaths of nearly 3,000 Americans on September the 11th, 2001, can face justice.”

Bush said his military commissions would ensure a full and fair trial for the accused and that “The Supreme Court determined that military commissions are an appropriate venue for trying terrorists, but ruled that military commissions needed to be explicitly authorized by the United States Congress.”

Yet this is not so. First, his is a gross mis-statement of the Court’s ruling in Hamdan v Rumsfeld, where it ruled that any military commission or court-martial proceeding must comply with the law of war as defined by our USMJ and the four Geneva Conventions of 1949.

Secondly, Bush could have had the trials long ago under these well-established rules. Instead he unilaterally and unnecessarily trashed our honored system of justice for no reason whatsoever. He would deny the accused such basic rights as knowing the evidence and witnesses against them, while allowing hearsay and potentially coerced testimony to be used as evidence

So why this need to run roughshod over our Constitution as well as our international obligations under historic treaties? If the government’s case is as strong as Bush tells us it is, then why the need to try them in Hitlerian style? For those kangaroo courts were similarly ordered, the verdicts all but certain before the “trials” ever began.

Further imperiling our Democracy, the president continually grabs more and more power to himself while trying to eliminate the checks and balances our Constitution demands. Most blatant are his “signing statements.” These are done after Congress—a Republican-dominated Congress at that—passes laws that are already reflective of his desires.

But this is not good enough. He has, over 750 times, RE-INTERPRETED those laws even further so that they will mean EXACTLY what he “interprets” them to mean. Never before his presidency has this been done to this degree, and it was never done at all until Reagan’s term of office.[1]

Traditionally, Congress hammers out compromises, the truest act of a representative democracy, and the President signs the bill or vetoes it, which allows Congress to re-address it. Instead President Bush has not vetoed even one bill. He deceptively ushers in members of both parties, smiles, signs and takes photos. THEN, he effectively reneges by making the newly signed law say what the Congress never intended.

These are anything but acts done within a true Democracy. They are more akin to the classic definition of fascism. A non-partisan Congress would not allow this to happen. But like the Reichstag in Hitler’s day, Congress goosesteps to its leader’s tune, ignoring the Constitution, the people and our over 200-year history of representative democracy.

Add to all this: 1) The Administration’s branding of dissenters as disloyal traitors, 2) their complete capitulation to the captains of commerce, 4) a populace made divided, suspicious and fearful, 4) unprecedented levels of scandalous Congressional sell-outs, and 5) a compliant media that has too often abdicated its traditional role as a watchdog for the truth and the commission of Democracy’s seven deadly sins is nearly complete.

I say nearly because in spite of efforts to chill it we still have a robust freedom of speech with many outlets for its voice. We remain Americans to the core, innately connected to the highest ideals of our nation’s noble beginnings. Regardless of the occasional shortcomings of its leaders Americans will in the end defend their democracy.

In the meantime we are left to love the sinner, while hating the sin.

[1] For an excellent review of Bush’s signing statements see: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2006/04/30/bush_challenges_hundreds_of_laws/

Repairing Our World with Flight 5191

I had planned to say something totally different, and in a similarly different tone, about the governor’s merit hiring settlement.

But I write this as I pray for the family and friends of loved ones lost on flight 5191, grateful that my itinerary called instead for the next flight through Cincinnati, on whose runway I now sit. My last trip was through Atlanta so I could just as easily have been among the dead or dying this ill-fated morning.

While I worried about who I may know aboard 5191 I realized that a co-worker may yet be on board and hoped beyond hope that he took a later flight instead (I later learned that he did).

I then wondered why the gates of our emotion should hinge so surely on our personal connections with those who pass on. After all, we are all brothers and sisters, and each life is equally precious. So while it is understandable that we feel more strongly about those who are close to us, familiarity is no pre-requisite for human empathy.

Thus does another catastrophe put in perspective the supposed hot issues of today, unmasking the truly trivial nature of our daily dramas. In this light the hiring debacle pales in importance.

This is to not to excuse either official mis-conduct or the all too prevalent political penchant for prioritizing greedy self-interest over our greater public interest. Rather it is to use this tragedy to direct our steps up a higher path, individually, and collectively.

Like 9/11 and hurricane Katrina, flight 5191 builds within our breasts a heartfelt human compassion--for the dead, for the grieving, and for each other. It may also leave us with a feeling of remorse as we perhaps regret the opportunities now forever lost to show our love, appreciation or kindly word to one we will never see again.

I recalled something I once heard about how much better our world would be were we to treat each other as if our next time together would be our last. As if we or they may be on the next flight 5191.

And it is by remembering this through all levels our community that we will repair our broken world.

Rfd 8/27/06

On Music Appreciation

A serendipitous sway shows the magic in the music we listen to today

What all started this whole train of musical appreciation thought was my 25+ year relationship with the fine folks at Hart Shaffner Marx’s designer suit division, the one that markets such suit labels as Kenneth Cole, Perry Ellis and Pierre Cardin.

A couple of years ago I was their guest for a Celine Dion concert at Caesar’s Las Vegas during the huge MAGIC menswear show.[1] Her incredible show began with the song Nature Boy, which I had vaguely remembered hearing sung by somebody, some long time back in my youth. My host told me the incomparable Nat King Cole first recorded this song, so when I returned home I bought the album, which I fished out and loaded in the sultry heat of my car while motoring around town today.

Now there are MANY musical masterpieces (and subjectively if any one person finds magic any music—yes, even, gangsta rap—then that music is for that person a masterpiece), but listening to the fluidly melodious voice of Nat King Cole, his accompanying orchestra and the arrangement on songs that defy the ages with familiarity made that word, “MASTERPIECE” bubble through my consciousness.

From “The Very Thought of You”, to “It’s Only a Paper Moon,” then “Route 66,” “Unforgettable,” and by “Mona Lisa” my spirits were soaring with appreciation for Mr. Cole, and for the power and magic of all and any music that can move our soul at any particular moment, mostly when we least expect it.

L is for the way you look at me O is for the only one I see V is very, very extraordinary E is even more than anyone that you adore can

You know, there are more than just the lyrics, the words and the voice that delivers them that creates the euphoric sensations we sometimes experience while listening to a song that strikes our soul. It is a micro-cosm of life, of all things working together in harmony that enables our enjoyment of, well, EVERYTHING.

Literally, everything, from the smallest toothpick to the most elaborate skyscraper--and even a little lily—is a culmination of hundreds, thousands of processes. Products come by an incredible series of human activity sharpened through centuries of building upon each prior generation’s progress and encompassing a worldwide network of people working together AS A TEAM. From the cultivators of raw materials, to the shippers, the designers, engineers, manufacturers, marketers, deliverers, maintainers and users it’s all one big harmonious interplay.

Just like the next song…”Don’t Get Around Much Anymore,”
♪ Missed the Saturday dance…Heard they crowded the floor…Couldn't bear it without you Don't get around much anymore…

And the next one… “Straighten up & Fly Right,”

The buzzard took the monkey for a ride in the air
The monkey thought that everything was on the square
The buzzard tried to throw the monkey off his back
The monkey grabbed his neck and said now listen, jack
Straighten up and fly right, Straighten up and fly right,Straighten up and fly right
Cool down, papa, don't you blow your top. (I love that line!)

And then my favorite, “Nature Boy,”[2] the haunting melody with the message of all that really matters:

There was a boyA very strange enchanted boy
They say he wandered very far, very farOver land and sea
A little shy and sad of eye But very wise was he
And then one dayA magic day he passed my way
And while we spoke of many things Fools and kingsThis he said to me
"The greatest thing you'll ever learn Is just to love and be loved in return"
"The greatest thing you'll ever learnIs just to love and be loved in return"

Again, the interplay of voice, of instrumentation, cadence and tempo create the finished product. And most important to our listening enjoyment are the sound engineers, the producers and the technology that allows me to motor around with music at my beck and call, recreating a 1948 performance as if they were performing for me alone. Incredible!

And “Unforgettable.” So “Smile.”


[1] The theatre, the lights, the setting and physical changes for each of her songs was 25th century spectacular, as was her whole concert…simply Unforgettably unbelievably great!

[2] Nature Boy was written by eden ahbez (he refused capitalization as he thought it reserved for the divine only), an unlikely source for one of the greatest songs of all time.

From the Wikipedia: eden ahbez, born Alexander Aberle (April 15, 1908 – March 4, 1995), and adopted by a Kansas family and raised under the name George McGrew, was one of the few genuinely unique characters of pre-rock American popular music.
Ahbez composed the song "Nature Boy" about friend and fellow freegan "Tribesman" Robert Gypsy Boots Bootzin, who was leading a lifestyle which strived to be all natural and Spartan.
Eden lived a bucolic life. He refused to use capital letters to spell his name. He travelled in sandals, camped out below the first L in the Hollywood sign above Los Angeles, studied Oriental mysticism, and cultivated a Christ-like appearance with his shoulder-length hair and beard. He claimed to live on three dollars a week, sleeping outdoors with his family, eating vegetables, fruits, and nuts.
In the mid-'50s, he did some recording with jazz musician Herb Jeffries; he also did some occasional composing and singing, sometimes for rock & roll novelty records. His most comprehensive statement as a recording artist, however, was the 1960 LP Eden's Island, a bizarre record which mixed exotica album and beatnik poetry. Many consider it as one of the weirdest exotica records ever created.
Ahbez was also photographed with Brian Wilson in the studio in 1966, lending further credence to the theory that the head Beach Boy was influenced by exotica during the Pet Sounds and Smile sessions. He died in 1995 after being hit by a car.

For even more about this incredible story and how he got his song to Mr. Cole you MUST read this: http://www.spaceagepop.com/ahbez.htm

Islam Falsely Accused

Before I eat another bite or take another breath I must correct a mis-characterization that if left to stand would sew ever more fear and hatred in our already compromised world. President Bush said in reference to the foiled London bomb conspiracy: “… this nation is at war with Islamic fascists who will use any means to destroy those of us who love freedom, to hurt our nation.”

He surely did not intend to disparage the Islamic faith or its adherents. Yet the effect of parroting a phrase so mindlessly repeated by many in the media is to unfairly condemn the Muslim world and in the process brand an entire religion as something that it most certainly is not

The truth is that yes, there are some people who want to commit heinous crimes against other people. In this case the alleged attackers were Pakistani British residents who were targeting passengers destined for America. Of course, those passengers would have included Muslim as well as Christian, and possibly Pakistani as well as American citizens.

Nevertheless, the high-profile nature of their crimes obscures the fact that they are but a tiny sub-sect of Islam. They in no way represent the mainstream body of faithful Muslims. Nor are they part of an alleged conspiracy for world domination for there simply is none.

This alleged plan is part of a self-fulfilling prophecy long enshrined in the concept of the “Clash of Civilizations,” first espoused by Samuel Huntington in 1993. While it is true that the effect of conflicts between the West and the Middle East are in that sense conflicts between two differing cultures, that is not the reason for such disputes per se.

The reason is as old as humanity itself: the quest for resources. The root cause of what they call “Islamic fascism” is not religious or cultural. Rather it is the incursions into the lands of those peoples, that to their sensibilities are dis-respectful, immoral and certainly done in a way that we would never tolerate in our own lands, thus violating the very heart of Christian ethics—do not unto others as you would not want done to yourself.

Islam is one of the three Abrahamic religions along with Judaism and Christianity. It has always been tolerant of these other religions, as the Koran teaches. Jewish citizens flourished under Muslim rule in Spain during the nearly 8 centuries of Moorish rule from 711 to 1492.
And you will find no greater praise for Jesus than in the Koran. In fact it esteems Jesus as the Messiah, the Word of God, God’s most enlightened and sinless prophet. For example:

· in Oud Emrom 5-45, Jesus is referred to as, "the greatest above all in this world and the world to come."

· S-5-46: "And, in their footsteps, we sent Isa (Jesus), the son of Marium (Mary), confirming the law that had come before him. We sent him the gospel. Therein was guidance and light, and confirmation of the law that had come before him. A guidance and an admonition to those who fear Allah (God)."


· 3.45: When the angels said: O Marium, surely Allah gives you good news with a Word from Him (of one) whose name is the '. Messiah, Isa son of Marium, worthy of regard in this world and the hereafter and of those who are made near (to Allah).

There is no conflict with Islam and those of other faiths. The heinous acts of those who see themselves as victims or fighting for victims do so in response to perceived injustices against them. As they perceive that more justice is shown to them—for instance, the ending of wars and dominations of their lands and the beginning of statehood for the Palestinians—the less mayhem they will attempt.

Remove the thorn to calm the lion.

Richard F. Dawahare 8/12/06

Is-raelity TV (TonyVision)

I’m tired. I’m just ready to give in. It’s been a week of high anxiety and low blows. It started with the shocking finality of a brother’s death—in reality a blessed release to eternal comfort for Tony, yet a gut wrenchingly sad void for us. Beyond this personal tumult rages the object of my non-professional political pointer—the war in Lebanon, of which I’d previously written from opposing viewpoints.

There is a string of meaning in Tony’s life, death and the events in the Middle East that exposes a higher truth. First, in Tony’s eulogy I stated the two themes of my life with him that jumped out. One, that love is truly a choice…and one we MUST make if we desire the happiest most fulfilled life for all. See, Tony had some innate characteristics that defied convention. Through these traits I learned to forego judgment, empathize more and love no matter what. This also enabled me to FEEL outside of the box, and thus, feel outside of my own perspective and comfort zone, which is the pre-requisite for empathy.

The second theme is the importance of humor no matter how dark the circumstances. The pre-requisite for enabling this humor to enter our lives is humility, the same ingredient that allows us to see our selves and our situation objectively. It allows us to literally laugh at ourselves when that scenario is called for.

His funeral brought together many people from a variety of backgrounds. There were Jewish, Christian, Muslim and I’m sure agnostic and atheist all present—and all united in the shared spirit of love and compassion. By sheer coincidence I had learned from my Jewish friend about a mother-in-law whose parents were killed during the Holocaust in Nazi concentration camps. She was a teen and escaped only by her cunning and suffering of various humilities.

He proved—graphically and emphatically—that the holocaust is NOT a distant memory. It is recent and real. He also proffered another slant on Israel’s invasion of Lebanon. First, he truly believes the Arabs, through Hamas and Hezbollah, really DO want to wipe out Israel. He also pointed to news reports and analysis that say this whole thing is really a power play for Iran to try and take control of the region, that there is struggle between Shiite (Iran, Syria) and Sunni Islam (Saudi, Egypt, Jordan), and by having Hezbollah successfully withstand Israel, leave them (Shiite) able to brag that they are the real protector and voice of Islam. Beyond that, such fundamentalists want to impose their religion by force on the rest of the world.

Apparently there is AGAIN virulent anti-Semitism in France, which is indication of a similar sentiment throughout Europe. This makes the recent memory of the Holocaust a very relevant reminder of the absolute necessity of a JEWISH homeland. Thus, the right of return for Palestinians admittedly done wrong by their expulsion in 1947-48, is not acceptable, for eventually they would outnumber the Jewish citizens and possibly vote to deny any more Jewish people in. WHERE WOULD THE NEWLY PERSECUTED JEWISH EVACUEES BE THEN?! It is a legitimate concern, friends, a legitimate concern.

At our mercy meal I spoke to a Palestinian immigrant friend, who was one of those thrown off their land. He came in 1951; his father was killed over there. The method of eviction was similar to the Lebanese situation now, except there were more men on the ground with weapons ruthlessly used against the defenseless native population with the certain intent to kill or create fear enough to make them flee. The ironic thing is that he said the vast majority back then were Christian Palestinians, most of whom have left leaving it predominantly Muslim.

Back to my Jewish friend who perceptively noted that the Palestinians are the new Jews. He then asks, “Why are they living in tents with all the surrounding Arab territory that could easily accommodate them?” He answers: because the Arab nations WANT IT THAT WAY! They want that festering sore in order to help bring about their real goal of destroying Israel. He truly, truly admits that there were injustices done early on, and even now, the killing of innocents is atrocious. But their very survival depends on rooting out the Hezbollah who hide amongst those innocents.

Even he admits that the deaths are too much and too damaging for Israel to continue and that they must have a ground invasion to truly control the Hezbollah, or negotiate some ending. He sees the bombing as I do: inappropriate and counter-productive.

Whew. I’m back to the beginning. The lessons of Tony Vision clear the path to peace. ONE, should all concerned choose to Love, practice EMPATHY, they would see that everybody is right in this conflict. TWO, using humor or in this case, HUMILITY, would have them conclude that the blood won’t dry until each of them says, “we’re sorry, we’re wrong.”



Richard F. Dawahare 7/30/06

A View from an Israeli’s Shoe

I can’t sleep. So I feel called to take a second look, really the 102nd look, at this Israeli/Palestinian situation this time by putting myself in the skin of a Jewish person. Not the superhuman “above-the-fray” person that exists mostly in the realm of spiritual idealism, but the human one, the feeling one, the one that’s about like me.

Okay, so now I am of a race, a culture that only 60 years ago was subject to the worst atrocity imaginable. Solely because of a trait over which I have no control—my blood, my ancestry—I was sought out for extermination. I was helpless, powerless, feebly and futilely consumed by the hate-filled bestiality of perverted humanity.

For centuries prior at different times and places, my forbears were similarly despised, falsely blamed, chased, burned at the stake or otherwise degraded on account of this same ethnicity.

But the holocaust made manifest the millennia of abuse known only through the history books. There are survivors, there are pictures and there are indescribable shudders of horror that anything like this could ever possibly happen again. God forbid we, me, my people—or any other strain of humanity—be so defenseless, so vulnerable to this treatment. By GOD’S will, by all that is true and just this should not, WILL NOT, happen again.

I begin to see that strength and self-reliance are crucial to preventing even the possibility of this occurring again. A safe land is the first step, a bastion of freedom for all—yes, especially of my race—who wish to come, or if the situation ever demanded—must come. And to insure protection against this past suffering I, we, will do anything. Hopefully, we can do it all with consistent justice and in accord to our highest nature, but when necessary we will do anything—ANYTHING—to insure our safety.

Yes, my people may have committed some acts against our highest nature that in other eras we would have decried, and yes, we may be doing them now. But the sin of these actions PALE in comparison to the sin done to us and to what we will prevent from ever occurring again. If we ever go down again it will never be from being weak, unprepared or unguarded. And who could blame us.

So in Israel, with help from others sure, but by OUR hands, by OUR will, have we forged this new land, this new security. Others in the region still seek our destruction; try as we might to get along. Why can’t they see, why can’t they feel, why can’t they empathize? Regardless, if they can’t and won’t refrain from harming us, we must stand ready to insure our safety. For this we have armed, we have trained, we have girded ourselves--boys, girls, men, women. Ourselves alone, for who stood up for us before, and on whom can we depend again? No one but ourselves, alone.
------------------------------

When I step back into my own skin I see it and understand it, and by damn, before I let anything like what happened before I’ll commit--or allow others in my behalf to commit--about ANY lesser atrocities.

And that is part of the tragedy, for if I can’t see more perspective—in this case that I/we are not endangered as we were for centuries before--then our actions that we think so essential to our preservation will on the contrary build resentment to our people and possibly, ironically, lead to a renewal of contempt against us—based only on blood and ancestry, yet again.

As I’ve long said—the situation is one where everybody is right. But the blood won’t dry till we (both sides) say we’re wrong.


Respectfully, Rfd 7/25/06

Beyond Israeli Propaganda: Jewish leaders cry ‘Emet’ (Truth)

“Rich, your family is from Lebanon originally, isn’t it? This must be killing you,” a friend asked in church this morning. “Yes, all my grandparents are from there[1]. And yes, it is difficult.”

Israel’s invasion is very problematic for me, and not nearly because Lebanon/Syria is the land of my forebears and where relatives still live. In fact, just as I was sitting down to write this my paternal cousin called, and then she initiated a three-way call with her daughter who is now in Beirut. I just spoke to her and her fiancé, who by coincidence is a distant cousin on my mother’s side.

But Israel’s terrorism on the Lebanese is troubling regardless of any personal connection I may have, for injustice is injustice no matter on whom it is visited. And while the perception may be that one with such ties can never be objective I should not let the potential charge “oh he’s just a homer” prevent my search for the highest truth and my standing upon that lofty perch.

On the contrary, I shudder to speak contrarily about Israel. I have longed believed in the necessity of some kind of Jewish homeland, especially in view of the Holocaust. Yet the roots of today’s conflict were sewn in the very creation of Israel by the eviction of nearly 1,000,000 Palestinians from lands they called home for over 2000 years.

Indeed, a review of today’s headlines show that Israel is using nearly identical methods to those in 1947-48 by attacking defenseless Lebanon, where Israel has driven 500,000 from their homes. 500,000. FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND. And why? Because, Israel says, Hezbollah captured 2 Israeli officers.

Is Israel really serious that their reason for killing innocent Lebanese children and destroying its infrastructure—bridges, airports, water, power, communications systems-- is that Hezbollah arrested a couple of their soldiers, when Israel has arrested many hundred times more in a tit-for-tat exercise that has been going on for years?

Not a chance. Israel has long planned this invasion, and typical of “might makes right” military machines, they have used lies, and politically appealing cover to justify this outrage.

What’s at play is much more sinister. Naseer Aruri, Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Massuchusetts, Dartmouth and author of Dishonest Broker, America’s Role in Israel and Palestine, said that by its invasion Israel seeks “…to forestall a diplomatic solution based on two states, for which Hamas has been more than ready.”

Professor Aruri cited Hamas’ Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh’s recent peace initiative that appeared in a Washington Post op-ed piece. “And it seems whenever Israel is threatened with a ceasefire or a peace offensive, it bombs its way out of a diplomatic settlement.”

And this is the nut. For all their stated desire for a Palestinian state Israel has sabotaged its creation by building settlements, conducting terror raids, building walls, depriving Palestinians of power, water and economic livelihood and laying down such a thick carpet of anti-Palestinian propaganda that American’s continue to support the billions we give Israel each and every year.

Of course Israel has the right to exist. Palestinians readily accept this, yet they insist on the same for them. As Haniyeh said, “We want what Americans enjoy—democratic rights, economic sovereignty and justice.” And until now, and ever since 1948 this has been denied to them by Israel’s defiance of not only International law but Judaism’s historic moral code.

The world does not need my protestations of Israeli intransigence. It can get all it would ever need from Jewish leaders themselves, who see in Israel a state acting ostensibly on their behalf, yet behaving so contrarily to their ancient moral code:

1) “How tragic that in our own time the very state established by Jews in the aftermath of this evil (the Nazi Holocaust) has become a place where racialism, religious discrimination, militarism and injustice prevail; and that Israel itself has become a pariah state within the world community. Events taking place today are all too reminiscent of the pogroms from which our own forefathers fled two and three generations ago -- but this time those in authority are Jews and the victims are Moslems and Christian Palestinians.”[2] [18 prominent Jews endorsed this ad in The Nation, calling for American Jews to “dissociate from Israel.” They expressed concern that "the close identification in the public mind between Israel and Jews -- an equation vigorously fostered by both the Zionist movement and the American Jewish lobby, which has come under its control -- threatens to stigmatize Jews everywhere."

2) Rabbi Reuben Slonim: “Today we Jews are losing [the] humanism and universalism of Judaism, all for the sake of Jewish statehood. We love Israel, and so we should, but we are so blinded by that love that we are willing to pay a prohibitive price for it. We condone acts we would declare unconscionable anywhere else in the world: nuclear weapons are wrong but necessary for Israel; apartheid is wrong, but for the sake of Israel's survival we will tolerate it; human rights are critical, but not for the Palestinians; we have a right to a state but Palestinians do not. Our racism towards Arabs would be regarded as anti-Semitism if others spoke of us in the same light. In all things we need to remember that the Jewish people and the Jewish state are but instruments, not ends in themselves; that what is good for the world is good for the Jews, not what is good for the Jews is good for the world; that the ultimate goal of the Jew, if he be truly Jewish, is to serve humanity.”[3]


3) Reb Binyomin, a prominent writer, strongly criticized actions that occurred during the creation of the Jewish state. In 1953 he wrote: "After the State of Israel was established, I began receiving news about the terrible things perpetrated both during and after the Israeli-Arab war. I did not recognize my own people for the changes which had occurred in their spirit. The acts of brutality were not the worst because those might have been explained somehow . . . Far more terrible was the benevolent attitude towards these acts on the part of public opinion. I had never imagined that such could be the spiritual and moral countenance of Israel. . .”[4]

4) Nathan Chofshi A Jewish settler who witnessed the birth of the Jewish state and did not like what he saw. In a 1959 reply to a rabbi who "parroted" the official version of the Palestinian exodus from Israel, he bore witness to the campaign to expel the Palestinian population: "We came and turned the Arabs into tragic refugees. And still we dare slander and malign them, to besmirch their name; instead of being deeply ashamed of what we did, and trying to undo some of the evil we committed, we justify our terrible acts and even attempt to glorify them.”[5]


5) One of the leading Israeli anti-Zionists today is concentration-camp survivor Israel Shahak, who currently heads the Israeli League for Civil and Human Rights. Shahak believes that "the State of Israel is a racist state: “In this state people are discriminated against, in the most permanent and legal way and in the most important areas of life, only because of their origin.”[6]

6) Israel Shahak again: “I would say the only human response to Holocaust is to try not to be like Nazis, in word or in deed. What brought the Holocaust was the racist attitude towards Jews, the division of German society into Jews and non-Jews on grounds of race. This is exactly the same thing that is happening in Israel.”[7]

7) Albert Einstein, Hannah Arendt and other Jewish leaders in a letter to the NY Times: “The public avowals of Begin’s party are no guide whatever to its actual character. Today they speak of freedom, democracy and anti-imperialism, whereas until recently they openly preached the doctrine of the Fascist state. It is in its actions that the terrorist party betrays its real character; from its past actions we can judge what it may be expected to do in the future.”[8]

8) “A shocking example was their behavior in the Arab village of Deir Yassin. This village, off the main roads and surrounded by Jewish lands, had taken no part in the war, and had even fought off Arab bands who wanted to use the village as their base. On April 9 (The New York Times), terrorist bands attacked this peaceful village, which was not a military objective in the fighting, killed most of its inhabitants—240 men, women, and children—and kept a few of them alive to parade as captives through the streets of Jerusalem.Most of the Jewish community was horrified at the deed, and the Jewish Agency sent a telegram of apology to King Abdullah of Trans-Jordan. But the terrorists, far from being ashamed of their act, were proud of this massacre, publicized it widely, and invited all the foreign correspondents present in the country to view the heaped corpses and the general havoc at Deir Yassin.The Deir Yassin incident exemplifies the character and actions of the Freedom Party. Within the Jewish community they have preached an admixture of ultranationalism, religious mysticism, and racial superiority. Like other Fascist parties they have been used to break strikes, and have themselves pressed for the destruction of free trade unions. In their stead they have proposed corporate unions on the Italian Fascist model. During the last years of sporadic anti-British violence, the IZL and Stern groups inaugurated a reign of terror in the Palestine Jewish community. Teachers were beaten up for speaking against them, adults were shot for not letting their children join them. By gangster methods, beatings, window-smashing, and wide-spread robberies, the terrorists intimidated the population and exacted a heavy tribute.”[9]

We should not be surprised at a reality that is so different from that which our government and media present to us. Every reference by Israel, by our government and our media to the Palestinians calls them “terrorists.”

Lost in our media’s constant referral to Palestinians as “terrorists” lays the true nature of Israel, long buried in the dead sea of propaganda. This nature was first described by none other than Albert Einstein, Hannah Arendt and other Jewish leaders in a December 4, 1948 letter to the New York Times. They condemned the emergence of what was to become the dominant political force in Israeli politics, the “freedom party,” led by Menachem Begin.

They said Begin’s party was “closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties. It was formed out of the membership and following of the former Irgun Zvai Leumi, a terrorist, right-wing, chauvinist organization.”

Then, a warning that has tragically been ignored ever since: “Before irreparable damage is done by way of financial contributions, public manifestations in Begin’s behalf, and the creation in Palestine of the impression that a large segment of America supports Fascist elements in Israel, the American public must be informed as to the record and objectives of Mr. Begin and his movement.”

Instead of heeding this advice America has given $160 BILLION over the last 50 years to the Israeli war machine. Every failure of peace is automatically blamed on the Palestinians. All events are sold from the perspective of an Israel built upon the corrupt foundation Dr. Einstein and others so courageously warned about.

The problems in the Middle East are primarily of Israel’s own making. To achieve peace they must:

1) END THE OCCUPATION;

2) Follow UN Resolution 242[10], and the more than 70 others that condemn Israeli behavior, its unlawful land grabs and their oppression of the Palestinian “refugees”;

3) Follow The Commission on Human Rights[11] directive to “desist from all forms of violation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, and other occupied Arab territories; to respect the bases of international law, the principles of international humanitarian law, its international commitments and the agreements it signed with the Palestine Liberation Organization; to withdraw from the Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem as a basic condition for achieving a just, lasting and comprehensive peace in the Middle East.”

Remove the thorn to calm the lion.




Respectfully, Richard F. Dawahare 7/23/06

PS Many of the quotations are from an article by Edward C. Corrigan, Jewish Criticism of Zionism, http://libaware.economads.com/jewcritzion.php

[1] My maternal grandparents were Lebanese (although I remember my grandmother saying she was born in Bethlehem) and my paternal grandparents from Syria. But prior to WWI this was all “Syria” and was controlled by the Turkish Ottoman Empire. My paternal great-grandfather was the Christian mayor of a small Syrian village. The Turks were killing all such non-Muslim leaders and killed him. My great-grandmother hid my grandfather in a well, as the Turks were looking for his oldest son to kill as well. He got out and emigrated to the US as a young teenager, meeting his wife in NY and settling in Jenkins, Ky. My maternal great-grandfather and others were conscripted in the Ottoman army. Many of the next generation came to America to avoid reaching a similar fate.
[2] "Time to Dissociate from Israel," The Nation, February 13, 1988, p. 19.
[3] Reuben Slonim, Grand to be an Orphan (Toronto: Clarke, Irwin & Company, 1983), p. 175.
[4] Hans Kohn, "Zion and the Jewish National Idea," The Menorah Journal, Autumn-Winter 1958, p. 42.
[5] Jewish Newsletter, 9 February 1959, cited in Gilmour, p. 74.
[6] Israel Shahak, "The Racist Nature of Zionism and the Zionistic State of Israel," The Link, Winter 1975-1976, p. 10. For an example of the work of the Israeli League for Human and Civil Rights see Report on the Violation of Human Rights in the Territories during the Uprising, 1988 (Tel Aviv: The Israeli League for Human and Civil Rights, 1988).
[7] Charles Glass, "Jews Against Zionism: Israeli Jewish Anti-Zionism," Journal of Palestine Studies, Autumn 1975/ Winter 1976, p. 77.
[8] Isadore Abramowitz, Albert Einstein et al, “New Palestine Party,” New York Times, Dec. 4, 1948; ProQuest Historical newspapers the New York Times (1851-2003) pg. 12.
[9] Albert Einstein, et al ibid.
[10] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UN_Security_Council_Resolution_242
[11] http://www.hri.ca/fortherecord2001/vol3/israelchr.htm

Who’s a Terrorist in the Middle East?

This site encompasses my personal philosophy of peace, so I reject forceful, violent means such as Hezbollah or Hamas use as well as the thorn inducing their actions, the violent conflict-initiating means Israel used to take land belonging to the Palestinians.

Yet this site also stands for truth, as best as we can define this often nebulous term. So it is fair and just to ask: just who is a terrorist, especially in the Middle East? If one honestly addresses the roots of the conflict in the Middle East one will find “terrorism” all around, starting with Israeli Zionists. In 1948 their terroristic “Freedom Party” (Tnuat Haherut) led by Menachem Begin, massacred the Arab village, Deir Yassin. Such terrorism continues this week with Israel’s horrid invasion in Lebanon, not made any less illegal by calling it a defensive response to Hezbollah.

Albert Einstein, Hannah Arendt et al in a letter to the NY Times (see below) accurately described the terrorist nature of the violent machine that was to control Israel. They said it was “a political party closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties.”

Those bands of Zionists massacred many defenseless Palestinian villages, which for hundreds of years had lived under Ottoman rule, and for at least 1500 of years before were home to native Arabs AND Jews (though a much smaller percentage). 750,000 to a million of the Arabs, the Palestinians, fled their homes at the gunpoint of Israeli terrorist guns.

That dislocation, that injustice, that crime against humanity is the root cause for all the problems in the Israeli/Palestinian/Hezbollah/Hamas/Syria conflict today. (With Iran, there is the additional layer of American subversion of internal politics for control of oil).

The further loss of territory in 1967, and later still, the many strategic Palestinian lands taken from them by the Israeli settlers—ALL illegal under numerous UN regulations—further entrench and strengthen those roots of discord.

Remove the thorn and the lion stops roaring. At the least: Israel--remove all illegal settlements, follow all UN resolutions, and there will be no Hamas or Hezbollah.

I personally know Palestinians chased by gunpoint from their homes. Even they—with this emotional experience fresh in their mind—accept the right of Israel to exist. They do not support the violent means, what we call the “terrorism” of those trying to right the wrong. Yet they yearn for justice, for re-compense. Others want their land back taken since 1967 or 1980 or 1990 or 2000.

Without at least this level of justice, forget it. There will be much worse catastrophes there, and because of that, all over the world.

Then it won’t matter whom you call “terrorist.”

PS Now we know why Israel wants nukes and all the military might they have. It’s the same reason Lebanon needs it (to prevent such Israeli monstrosities as occurred this week and in the 1980’s). It’s why Iran and Syria want it. Why should one country have it and not another? Oh, because they are countries that support “terrorists” namely, the unorthodox defenders of a cause that is just—the reclamation of illegally taken lands by Israel with the support of the United States. Might makes right when it’s wearing the right colors, and when there’s so much more of it than on the side that opposes it.

PPS A logical retort from the “other side” to a question in a recent Louisville Courier-Journal editorial Terrorist provocation, “Those who have clucked about a "disproportionate" Israeli response might ask themselves what government anywhere would accept such murderous provocations without delivering a powerful response” would be “what group of people could remain passively submissive to the initiators of murderous provocations?”

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1948 letter of protest against Israeli 'fascists', 'terrorists'

A Letter To The EditorHANNAH ARENDT, ALBERT EINSTEIN, et alThe New York Times, 2 December 1948Among the most disturbing political phenomena of our times is the emergence in the newly created state of Israel of the “Freedom Party” (Tnuat Haherut), a political party closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties. It was formed out of the membership and following of the former Irgun Zvai Leumi, a terrorist, right-wing, chauvinist organization in Palestine. The current visit of Menachem Begin, leader of this party, to the United States is obviously calculated to give the impression of American support for his party in the coming Israeli elections, and to cement political ties with conservative Zionist elements in the United States. Several Americans of national repute have lent their names to welcome his visit.It is inconceivable that those who oppose fascism throughout the world, if correctly informed as to Mr. Begin’s political record and perspectives, could add their names and support to the movement he represents. Before irreparable damage is done by way of financial contributions, public manifestations in Begin’s behalf, and the creation in Palestine of the impression that a large segment of America supports Fascist elements in Israel, the American public must be informed as to the record and objectives of Mr. Begin and his movement.The public avowals of Begin’s party are no guide whatever to its actual character. Today they speak of freedom, democracy and anti-imperialism, whereas until recently they openly preached the doctrine of the Fascist state. It is in its actions that the terrorist party betrays its real character; from its past actions we can judge what it may be expected to do in the future.Attack on Arab VillageA shocking example was their behavior in the Arab village of Deir Yassin. This village, off the main roads and surrounded by Jewish lands, had taken no part in the war, and had even fought off Arab bands who wanted to use the village as their base. On April 9 (The New York Times), terrorist bands attacked this peaceful village, which was not a military objective in the fighting, killed most of its inhabitants—240 men, women, and children—and kept a few of them alive to parade as captives through the streets of Jerusalem.Most of the Jewish community was horrified at the deed, and the Jewish Agency sent a telegram of apology to King Abdullah of Trans-Jordan. But the terrorists, far from being ashamed of their act, were proud of this massacre, publicized it widely, and invited all the foreign correspondents present in the country to view the heaped corpses and the general havoc at Deir Yassin.The Deir Yassin incident exemplifies the character and actions of the Freedom Party. Within the Jewish community they have preached an admixture of ultranationalism, religious mysticism, and racial superiority. Like other Fascist parties they have been used to break strikes, and have themselves pressed for the destruction of free trade unions. In their stead they have proposed corporate unions on the Italian Fascist model. During the last years of sporadic anti-British violence, the IZL and Stern groups inaugurated a reign of terror in the Palestine Jewish community. Teachers were beaten up for speaking against them, adults were shot for not letting their children join them. By gangster methods, beatings, window-smashing, and wide-spread robberies, the terrorists intimidated the population and exacted a heavy tribute.The people of the Freedom Party have had no part in the constructive achievements in Palestine. They have reclaimed no land, built no settlements, and only detracted from the Jewish defense activity. Their much-publicized immigration endeavors were minute, and devoted mainly to bringing in Fascist compatriots.Discrepancies SeenThe discrepancies between the bold claims now being made by Begin and his party, and their record of past performance in Palestine bear the imprint of no ordinary political party. This is the unmistakable stamp of a Fascist party for whom terrorism (against Jews, Arabs, and British alike), and misrepresentation are means, and a “Leader State” is the goal.In the light of the foregoing considerations, it is imperative that the truth about Mr. Begin and his movement be made known in this country. It is all the more tragic that the top leadership of American Zionism has refused to campaign against Begin’s efforts, or even to expose to its own constituents the dangers to Israel from support to Begin.The undersigned therefore take this means of publicly presenting a few salient facts concerning Begin and his party; and of urging all concerned not to support this latest manifestation of fascism.[signed]Isidore Abramowitz, Hannah Arendt, Abraham Brick, Rabbi Jessurun Cardozo, Albert Einstein, Herman Eisen, M.D., Hayim Fineman, M. Gallen, M.D., H.H. Harris, Zelig S. Harris, Sidney Hook, Fred Karush, Bruria Kaufman, Irma L. Lindheim, Nachman Maisel, Seymour Melman, Myer D. Mendelson, M.D., Harry M. Oslinsky, Samuel Pitlick, Fritz Rohrlich, Louis P. Rocker, Ruth Sagis, Itzhak Sankowsky, I.J. Shoenberg, Samuel Shuman, M. Singer, Irma Wolfe, Stefan Wolfe.—New York, Dec. 2, 1948