Salem-News.com Canada articles Page 32

Whither, America?

What every thinking, humanly caring American (which rules out Republicans as a class) needs to do is open the window or go out on their balcony or front step and shout as loud as they can: I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - After 9/11, the civilized world rallied around America. The tragic thing, though, is that America never rallied around itself.

The headline alone in today’s New York Times filled me with anger and frustration because the only thing I can do is write this article.

Maslow Effect Amok

What has happened to America the free?

(CALGARY, Alberta) - It was only yesterday that I published my article explaining the Maslow Effect. Today, the New York Times has a story egregiously demonstrating it.

The story is about some conservative parents in Houston (and around the nation), who are absolutely opposed to President Obama’s speech next Tuesday from a school in Virginia being streamed live on the White House website to classrooms nationwide where their children will be exposed to it. They see it as political propaganda.

The Maslow Effect

Fanaticism requires the endless outpouring of propaganda.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, goes the old saying. So, it turns out, are social truths. I’m here today to explain.

A psychiatrist is testing a patient. He shows him the first of the ten Rorschach inkblots and asks him to describe what he sees. The man volunteers a detailed description of sex between a man a woman. With the second inkblot, he describes a graphic sex scene between two men. Men, women, animals—it was the same kind of response for the remaining eight.

Fixing Democracy

It may have been just an opium dream, but I have figured out the way to fix democracy.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - There’s a piece going around the internet these days—I received it twice in the last week—allegedly written by Charley Reese who was reportedly a journalist for forty-nine years. It’s called “545 people”.

His argument is simple. The problem with politics is the politicians.

The Houdini Tax Trick

My argument is that if corporate taxes were eliminated, then there could be fairer price competition among businesses.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - Houdini was able to make an elephant disappear in a crowded theatre. How was he able to do it? Misdirection.

Misdirection is the primary process in our tax system and no one wants to explain it. I’ve tried more than once over the last thirty years, but the mainstream media (the little people who are the gatekeepers) will not touch it. Here it is.

Rethinking Corporate America

I know, I know, Americans believe in individuality, but thoughtful Americans know they’ve been sold a bill of goods.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - This is a heuristic exercise—which my dictionary defines as “encouraging a person to learn, discover, understand, or solve problems on his or her own”. My job is to give you the information with which to do that.

In 1600, Queen Elizabeth I and a few of her court intimates founded the East India Company. As part of the founding charter she granted the company limited liability for losses on the part of the enterprise’s backers.

Our Electronic Lives

As if the potential disasters weren’t enough, you can now add solar storms to the list of potential disasters you can pretend you don’t know about.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - One clumsy (not enchanted) evening I knocked over a glass of Pepsi, spilling it on my modem, giving it an apparently fatal injury.

While I was waiting for a new modem to arrive, it tried it every day, but to no avail. Pepsi is sticky; beer is not.

My Fear of Plagiarism

The mixed values of a safe and original set of words.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - As a writer I have a deathly fear of plagiarism. It begins immediately with my hyperawareness that every word in my sentences have been published elsewhere, by someone else.

Am I putting myself at risk by reusing them? I think individual words are probably okay. They are in the dictionary which, I hope, makes them public domain.

Alien Abduction in Calgary

Go downtown on any weekday and you’ll find it easy to spot the aliens.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - I recently spent a morning as an observer at the provincial criminal court in Calgary. There were the usual run of the mill cases—some individuals were clearly bad news; some individuals were clearly confused about how they got there—when a woman in custody appeared in the prisoner’s box and changed my entire perspective on the proceedings.

She looked used and abused, making it difficult to guess her age, but I would say about 30.

Banks as Legal Thieves (VIDEO)

Reasons why the banking crisis hit the US so hard.

(CALGARY, Alberta) - In the 1960s Sam Bronfman, who grew the Seagram’s name into a world-wide liquor empire worth billions, was asked what he thought was mankind’s most important invention. His reply, in one word: Interest.

Bill Abram, a retired high school teacher, began by wondering why so many of his students were caught up on drugs, so he started to investigate the money system. It took him into areas no one would have thought of: Privatization gone amok.