One thing we can count on
The power of the word
The Bible, Koran, Torah *(1) shows it
By actions of the herd/heard
Sanctimonious, violent, self-righteous
Judgmental and superior
Believers stuck in their positions *(2)
All others inferior
Religion is a strategy
Paying dividends at large
Pacification and submission
By the intellects in charge *(3)
Nostradamus had predicted
Two thousand twelve the end
It passed us without incident
We can breathe a sigh again *(4)
Now. . . , if you take that power
Apply it to the law
Convince the many living
It’s advantageous to us awl *(5)
It would quell most opposition
Add fear, a tool that works
Then televise the mayhem
For empathy never hurts *(6)
You can control the end game goal
With shepherds against the flock *(7)
Put the masses on a treadmill
And dissention easily stops
The law requires its’ keepers
Cop-stoppers with a book
Writing tickets for a paycheck
And catching cheating crooks *(8)
Now, if you write the laws
Anything can go *(9)
Always pointing outward
You thereby run the show
Case in point the intellectuals
Think tanks and college pro’s
Who use their words as weapons
With regulations growing slow *(10)
House Republicans, as example
Back in two thousand eleven
Changed the “Truth in Testimony” *(11)
Increasing the effect of leaven
“Wall Street sponsored professors”. . .
Assumed academic neutrality
In writing up their comments
Changed the laws’ reality
Man’s inhumanity to man
Speaks volumes through the law
As in Financial Regulations
Republicans building in a flaw
‘Expert witnesses’ allowed withhold
Their unwholesome money ties
To Wall Street, banks and business
As such, promulgate a lie
Professors on the take
Staking out a claim
Five thousand for a comment *(12)
No one could hardly blame
Money has no conscience
Just paper marked with ink
Hired guns, who sit in towers *(13)
Getting’ paid for what they think.
11/3/13
*(1) Perhaps the main thing that any of these books have to show us is
that if something is written down and you convince enough people that it is
correct, you can establish a force in the world that will perpetuate
itself. It’s like when something is stuck in the personal ego, it becomes
a force at the individual level. Parallel that to having the idea
ingrained in the collective unconscious, it’s a force to be reckoned with.
*(2) “Believers stuck in their positions” . . . People that are anchored in
their ego and the collective unconscious (pack mentality).
*(3) Someplace in Revelations it refers to the whore, the church has often
been referred to as such. The church receives tax exempt status; (501-C3)
but for that status, it is supposed to remain non-political. I personally
have attended churches where anything but that was true. We got George W.
pushed down our throat when he was running against Kerry. The pastor used
his force of personality and respect of the congregation to undermine Kerry
and belittle anyone who might think they were for him. Consequently, we
left that church. When the pastor returned to get a haircut, from my now
ex-husband, he asked him if somehow he’d let him/us down. Freddy told him
straight out, “you know Bob, I went to Vietnam to fight for my freedom,
which includes my freedom to vote for the candidate of my choice. As a
matter of fact, I fought for your right to vote also.” Bob didn’t have
much to say, but he never came back.
In theory, by giving the religious institutions tax exempt status, it’s
supposed to stifle their voice. The preachers and pastors still have their
say; but don’t hold any marches or do anything too visible.
The other obvious thing about encouraging Christianity, preaching the power
of prayer [verses action] and that Christians will go to heaven when Jesus
returns, you cause people to become submissive.
Something referred to in other poems, Jesus was not a Christian, he was a
heretic, turning away from the Jewish religion. A movement was created
after his death and named after him.
*(4) Again, we see the power of the word. Nostradamus made a lot of people
a lot of money. Writers wrote extensively on the meaning of his
predictions. Some spent money attempting to protect themselves against
problems they could see.
It reminded me of Y2K or whatever it was they had predicted about computers
failing and taking out the banking system. In retrospect I think that was
a ‘think-tank’ strategy attempting to judge what effect a predicted
phenomenon would have on society.
*(5) Because of the cultural bias and propensity to believe without
question, our law-makers have taken a queue from that tendency. I
personally believe that the ‘think-tanks’ have a hand in helping to set the
foundation for creating the new laws. My theory is that they set up a
situation that scares the ‘BaJesus’ out of people, then come in with a
solution or new law.
Nine-eleven [911] is a perfect example, The Patriot Act was passed in no
time at all, which greatly curtailed our rights and expanded the powers of
government. There have been rumors that the government had ‘intelligence’
that something was in the works. Did they know, but not act on it because
it set the stage for the Patriot Act; or was it something more mercenary?
Perhaps it will be like the Kennedy assassination, we won’t be told until
all or most of the people involved are dead.
*(6) Fear is a wonderful tool to use against people to get them to go
along. For example, it is illegal to pass an Ex-post Facto Law. My
understanding of that is you can’t create a law that will prosecute an act
that already happened. Basically, if there is no law prohibiting a thing,
it’s not illegal or subject to prosecution. It may be immoral or
unethical; but there would be no legal basis for prosecution.
An example of a violation of the Ex-post Facto Law, is the Three Strikes
Law. If someone had committed a crime prior to the Three Strikes Law, it
should not be swept into the category of counting under that law. The
argument would be that if a person realized he would get sent away forever
under the Three Strikes Law prior to committing the first or second
offense, they might not have done so. But, as a society we haven’t moved to
have that law struck down, or take the legal system to task over using
crimes committed before that law came into effect. Why? partially because
we don’t care. We’re happy when we think people who might be a danger to
us are locked up.
As far as using the term ‘empathy’ in the poem, we feel sympathy for people
who die, in part because we consider our own mortality; we put ourselves in
their position.
*(7) Here in Louisiana we have layers of law enforcement. We have
Sheriff’s at the local level, Police, then also State Police. I don’t
really have a distinction between them. It seems that out here in West
Monroe, if you have a problem, it’s the Sheriff’s office that you call. In
Monroe, you call the Police Department. Then you see the State Trooper or
State Police patrolling the Interstate and some highways, they issue
tickets and stop the trucks to make sure their loads are right and their
equipment is up to some standard.
All of the aforementioned are just doing a job for which most of us are
happy, as long as it’s not us with our neck in the noose.
Most working poor are on a treadmill or a hamster wheel, running like a
son-of-a-gun trying to stay ahead of their bills. People who are committed
to staying even with the board do their best to stay on the right side of
the law.
While the Constitution or Bill of Rights suggests we should have the ‘right
of the pursuit of happiness,’ the law structures ways in which we may not
be free to do that.
*(8) I use the term cheating crooks very loosely. You can get a ticket for
not wearing a seat belt. What’s that about? It’s basically a law that the
insurance industry wanted to put through because they got tired of sewing
people’s faces back on, it cost them too much. Children on school busses
don’t have to wear seat belts. The difference is, on the one hand you have
an organized group, the state education department, versus individuals.
State taxes could be utilized to fight the law to keep the schools from
implementing it, whereas individuals don’t have the wherewithal. We elect
officials to defend and protect our rights; but we get sold out.
*(9) ‘Obamacare’ or the Affordable Care Act is the first thing that comes
to mind. Congress, as an example, is responsible for writing the laws; but
they can exempt themselves from the laws they write. Or, they can write
loop-holes in them, allowing them to legally operate outside laws they
wrote for others. An example of that is Campaign Funding. Candidates
raise monies to put on their campaigns; but are not allowed to use those
funds for private use. Yet, if they belong to a Leadership PAC, they have
ways they can draw on those funds that for the rest of us would be
considered private use. One man used $100,000 dollars of campaign funds at
the golf course.
Rodney Alexander paid his daughters out of his funds. He paid one $74,000
and the other $58,000. When asked by the man doing the interview for 60
Minutes, he said, it was legal to pay people that worked in his campaign;
it did not violate the nepotism laws.
This is the same Rodney Alexander who put himself in the campaign and
served for 6 months before announcing he would not run for another term.
The next day resigned and was offered a job as head of Veterans Affairs.
[Now the VA is being investigated for its medical treatment of veterans.]
Then we tax-payers had to turn around and have another election to replace
him. I’d be curious to find out if he ran with the intention of utilizing
the rest of his campaign funds, bleeding them off to his daughters.
You hear about people in Congress doing fund-raising even after they get
into office; I thought it was some proactive behavior to get ready for the
next race. Although I always thought they should probably concentrate on
their job. But to find out they could legally draw from their campaign
funds made a whole other dimension of malfeasance available.
We are kept so busy trying to walk between the lines, we don’t question the
veracity of the dictums that are dished out to us.
*(10) Until I read the article in the magazine The Nation by Lee Fang,
entitled Scholars For Sale, I didn’t understand why it’s taken Congress so
long to put regulations in place to keep another 2008 debacle from
happening. You might remember, it cost taxpayers some $800 billion dollars
to bail the financial industry out.
The Dodd-Frank financial reform law to monitor predatory lending practices
“delegates broad rule-making power for some 400 regulations to a variety of
agencies, giving lawyers and lobbyists the opportunity to flood
policy-makers with comments,” this has caused reform to be slowed way down.
To be more specific, “the Volcker Rule alone – a regulation to prevent
federally insured banks from making risky investments with depositors’
money – attracted more than 17,000 comments, including many from professors
submitting their research.” Hal Scott, a Harvard Law school professor
seeking to block the rule received nearly $1.3 million in compensation
since 2007, from a nonprofit financed by Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Wells
Fargo and other investment banks, according to Lee Fang. So, I guess in
the meantime, as long as nothing concrete has been decided, the
institutions that are slowing down the process can use depositor’s money in
whatever way that suits the institution not disallowed by the law.
*(11) The “Truth in Testimony” forms now ask only if an expert witness has
received earmarks or government grants, it does not require them to divulge
that they are being paid to submit their comments or ‘research findings.’
The House Republicans in 2011 put through the ethics procedure change.
This, like the campaign funding law, allows the people working with and for
Congress to act with impunity, free from breaking a law or punishment.
The use of the term ‘leaven’ was an example of me taking license, it worked
with eleven. Leaven in bread causes it to rise/rise, metaphorically those
on the take can do it better if they don’t have a hammer hanging over their
heads.
*(12) According to Fang, professors get paid as much as $5,000 for a
comment letter.
*(13) It’s funny, if you stop to think about it. Everyone makes a fuss at
kids who bully other children; but these acts, though considered
sophisticated, thoughtful measures to increase one’s income, really amount
to the same thing. People are using their intellect to get over on those
who are not as blessed intellectually or educated equally.
Tag: Philosophy, Religion
