I’m working on a few projects and haven’t been watching the news feeds as vigilantly as I have in the past.  Not because I don’t care about the news and delivering it but the news somehow isn’t saying much that I haven’t heard before.  And I hate repeating myself like a mainstream parrot.

Alas, that is part and parcel of media and its wretched 24 hour news cycle.  The public’s attention span has been whittled away, their focus is emotionally political rather than grounded in civics and to keep one’s finger on that pulse too long is to be awash in a sea of petty idiocy and hot air.

Free press is a lone boat with one tattered sail praying to see a lighthouse.  It’s a shitty job but someone has been doing it for a long time – longer than me – only to be met with more censorship the harder we row.  There is no quitting, however.  For those of us who respect and love the power of the pen, quitting is simply not an option.

I’m working on building some lighthouses with other media people.   The horizon ahead isn’t clear for many because the mainstream media fog gets thicker every day.  While stories like these go unheeded by the majority – like so many buried columns or spun into fodder to keep people ordering dessert while the Titanic takes on more water:

At the top of that list…JP Morgan.  Keep in mind that Jamie Dimon received a $23 million pay package for fiscal year 2011, more than any other bank CEO in the United States.

“Marion Nestle, Professor in the Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health at NYU, came out with some interesting tidbits regarding the food stamp program.  One of them is extraordinarily disturbing.  She shows that Wal-Mart gets as much as 25% to 40% of revenue at some stores from food stamp dollars.  This says it all folks.  Food stamps are of course the perfect business for Wal-Mart and JP Morgan, which as I pointed out previously makes a lot of money running the program and keeping the populace in perpetual serfdom.”  [What do you think will happen when JP Morgan fails?  See first headline…]

“…none of the measures address the most critical issue pertaining to Europe: where is the money going to come from?”

This really isn’t rocket science.  Mainstream media talks to the public like children with no basic math skills to keep them from asking questions.  The hard questions are and have been being asked by independent press and the truth delivered with stunning accuracy.  But because money equals speech and attention spans are have waned – critical thinking people will have to work harder if they love life and the people they share it with.  I’m no math scholar but I have connected these dots.

Time and a lot of meditation brought me to understand and accept the picture that is forming.  It no longer scares me more than it makes me concerned for others who have not yet made the connections.  It is the reason I keep going.

“How radical are you?  Do you love life?  Are you willing to fight for it?“

Many of those dear to me who are not connecting the dots, I love as much as I love life, so I am willing to be as radical as necessary – for them.  That is why I am scouting ahead to learn about a more durable set of living arrangements.  I think of it as choosing the option of a stronger foundation for my lighthouse so I can be prepared, not just for myself but for others who will need these skills when the time comes.  I will personally become more durable.  Resilient.

This system hates that…so of course, it is in my nature to automatically relish it.

It is so surreal and odd that my grandparents victory gardening skills, ability to create community to survive through the Great Depression by sharing skills, food and resources would be or seem at all radical.  This is how I know the current system is very, very sick and I do not wish to participate in it.  It quite honestly, made me spiritually ill.

My whole life, I have been willing to fight for what I love…what I learn in New Mexico will only make me more able.  Quitting is not an option. Quitting this system, however, is easy when its function prevents the exercise of inalienable rights like life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness on a global scale, not just at home.

American rights and democracy aren’t lifestyle options – these are things that die when they aren’t used.