Salem-News.com Canada articles Page 31

The Fall of America

[This is an unchanged article I originally published 25 years ago in the Winter 1984 edition of the now defunct Canadian magazine Goodwin’s. I reprint it now only because it is still relevant today.]

(CALGARY, Alberta) - American society in the mid-1980s is increasingly conservative, jingoistic and paranoid about its national defence capability. Many of its institutions have been infiltrated by the New Right and its economy is in decline. Some argue it is on the inevitable road to totalitarianism.

If we compare the United States of today with the Germany of the 1930s, the sounding of such an alarm might be justified, although arguments based on analogies are always inexact.

The DST Caper

It was sometime in the 1950s that the American branch of the International Time Bank was established in a secret location somewhere in the continental United States. It’s there that the 300 million or so American hours are deposited every spring.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - November 1, 2009 So, you’ve got the hour back, the hour the government “borrowed” last spring. But, did you get any interest on that loan? Didn’t think so.

My Eleventh Finger

I hold up my left hand and count the fingers backward: ten-nine-eight-seven-six, then I hold up my right hand and say—and five makes eleven. Little kids always laugh at that but immediately deny it even though they don’t know the illogic involved.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - They say that as you age, memory is the first thing to go. I wish I could remember what the second thing is.

One thing that fascinates me is not so much that we remember things, but what we remember.

The Immorality of the Job Hunt

The sooner more Americans come to understand that we’re all in this together the sooner the quality of life for everyone will improve.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - What’s the point of living together in a society if there are no benefits to the association? If it turns out that there’s little point, then lawlessness makes just as much sense.

Actually, America is close to that situation already in its belief that a free-market, every-man-for-himself ethic is best. It is only demonstrably best if you are one of the haves.

Cat House

A lighthearted look at frolicking feline fun for your Friday.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - “Cats are a standing rebuke to behavioral scientists wanting to know how the minds of animals work. The mind of a cat is an inscrutable mystery, beyond human reach, the least human of all creatures and at the same time, as any cat owner will attest, the most intelligent.” (Lewis Thomas)

While I’ve lived with many cats in my life—when married, we had as many as three cats in the household—Max, the tabby in the picture, is the first cat with whom I’ve had ever had an individual bond. Max was given to me on March 31, 1997 by Colleen Way, a woman I was dating at the time.

Zionist Spin in Canada may Weaken

A major Canadian broadcaster files for bankruptcy.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - Canwest, Canada’s largest media company, spanning newspapers, television and radio, with investments overseas, has changed since company founder Israel (Izzy) Asper died in October, 2003 and CanWest was taken over by his son, Leonard.

In January 2007, the company bought Alliance Atlantis at a cost of $2.3-billion, acquiring its 13 specialty TV channels. But the deal was expensive and to finance it, CanWest entered into a complex partnership with investment bank Goldman Sachs.

How Capitalism Destroyed American Democracy: Part 2 (of 3)

Ding! Americans do not live in a democracy but a plutocracy. Wake up and smell the coffee.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - In Part 1 (“How capitalism destroyed American democracy, Part 1” http://www.salem-news.com/articles/september242009/us_democracy_9-24-09.php ), I reviewed Vance Packard’s 1960 book The Waste Makers. I argued that any appearance of democracy in North America has been nullified and undermined by the twin capitalist idols of growth and consumption.

Many, if not most Americans, believe that growth and consumption are good things . But Packard noted that US oil consumption had tripled in the fifteen years since end of WW II. “With only one seventh proved reserves, the US is consuming more than half the world’s production.”

America the Prude

America! Wake up and get a life. Sometimes people swear. Get over it.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - As a society, America is in a parlous condition. One of the principle causes, I think, is the inability of Americans as a people to face reality. That, coupled with an incredible hypocrisy has brought America low. Two egregious examples. No one can forget, even if they never saw it (I didn’t), Janet Jackson’s “wardrobe malfunction” (the term, used in all seriousness, sounds like something that would emerge from a Monty Python skit) and secondly Bono, receiving a Golden Globes Award in 2003 was so delighted that he said . "This is really, really f------ brilliant." The context and the great smile on his face makes clear that his comment is neither profane or obscene.

Try telling that to all the “concerned” citizens whose main “concern” is to impose their small-minded, backward-looking, Puritanism on the entire nation. The tragedy to this is that the majority of Americans just roll over and let them do it.

The Pagan Christ

“The end of Christianity is coming because there is a system undergirding the traditional ‘economy of salvation’ which is more concerned with preserving its own power than exploring the truth.”-Harpur

(CALGARY, Alberta) - BOOK REVIEW:
The Pagan Christ: Recovering the Lost Light

Tom Harpur, Author


Hutterites are literalists in that they take the second commandment literally and brook no variations or relaxations. This phenomenon, argues Tom Harpur, is the source of the overwhelming harm that religion inflicts on society.

“Most of the atrocities committed by the Church and its more rabid followers down through the ages have been directly inspired by literalist thinking.

Falling Down

The psychology of ”Falling Down” is the story of so much of America today. If ignorance is bliss, why are so many Republicans angry?

(CALGARY, Alberta) - Every once in awhile, I’ll remember a line from a movie that’s only an elusive, tantalizing fragment. I don’t remember who said it, or even the movie. It happened a few days ago when I was writing “Whither, America?”

I’ve always been a great movie fan, but not obsessive. Because it’s been about 15 years since I’ve watched any TV, I don’t see the runners for new movies. I get my movie news from newspapers I read online. So, there are lots of movies released that I’ve never even heard of.