Americans and Their Disturbing Priorities

George Bush and Dick Cheney started an illegal war that cost trillions of tax dollars, thousands of American lives and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives, destroyed the infrastructure of a country and left the Middle East in a state of perpetual violence, yet “patriots” have their panties in a bind because an African-American football player didn’t stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Clinton Picks Signaling an Anti-Progressive, Corporate Friendly Administration

Hopes were high among liberals and progressives in January 2009 as this country’s first African American was inaugurated President of the United States. Barack Obama had run his campaign around a simple slogan, “change,” and for many of us who voted for him, that meant charting a new course away from the horrendous failures of the Bush administration toward peace and prosperity. It didn’t take long, however, for us to see that our hopes were once again misplaced.

In the early months of 2009, anticipation turned to trepidation as Obama began announcing his new cabinet, and we saw positions being filled by long-time Wall Street insiders, well-connected Washington bureaucrats and political cronies, none of whom could remotely be considered “agents of change.” Instead of a new direction, we were treated to a new face continuing many of Bush’s worst national and international policies.

Fast-forward to 2016. In this election cycle, it’s a race between a particularly repulsive Republican, Trump and the Democrat who could be the first female President in U.S. history, Hillary Clinton. That sounds good on paper, but once again, what is being billed as a historic moment in this country’s history is turning into a win for the status quo, business-as-usual crowd that actually runs America. The only difference this time around is that we progressives have no illusions about Clinton’s establishment leanings, despite the requisite liberal rhetoric of the campaign season.

Do I sound cynical or realistic? Exhibit A: Clinton chose as her running mate Virginia Senator Tim Kaine, a moderate Democrat who has supported, and recently voted for, the onerous TPP agreement. Exhibit B: Just yesterday, Clinton named former Colorado Democratic Senator and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to be chair of her presidential transition team, the position that will oversee the selection of thousands of presidential appointments should Clinton win the election.

So what’s the big deal with Salazar? Well, as a Senator and Interior Secretary, he continuously demonstrated he was a friend to big oil, gas, and the mining and ranching industries. He opened the Arctic Ocean to oil drilling and played Michael Brown with his botched response to the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. On top of that he is an ardent supporter of the TPP and fracking. In short, Salazar is an old school corporate shill disguised as a Democratic politician, and Clinton’s choice for one of the most important positions on her transition team.

The national media is doing its job by perpetuating the myth that American voters have a real choice in this presidential election, and contrasting an obvious nutcase like Trump against Hillary surely helps reinforce that narrative, but reality is quite different. Whether Hillary or Trump is elected President, the powers behind the scenes will continue to implement the military/industrial/media agenda at the expense of democracy and the economic future of the 99 percent. Hillary is already indicating the direction she wants to take this country as President, and it is a ruinous, if familiar, path of greed, war and environmental decimation.

No Matter Who Wins the White House, Americans Lose

Are you as nauseated, saddened, horrified and disgusted by this Presidential election campaign as I am? In one generation, mine, this country has gone from the world’s beacon of democracy and prosperity to the giant village idiot bumbling and stumbling incoherently around the planet, an untethered corporate mascot gone berserk.

With the ascension of Trump, our election process has become an international joke, and other countries look at us with pity and sadness as they watch a once admired champion lean helplessly against the ropes, punch-drunk and bran damaged, in what is surely its final round.

We are here today thanks to greed, plain and simple. Despite a booming economy and a real chance for citizens to live the American dream, the military/industrial/media complex of the 1960s/70s, like Frankenstein’s monster suddenly realizing it has superhuman strength, woke up to its horrible potential to influence this country’s political process through its wealth and connections to America’s elites. The ball really got rolling during the Reagan administration with its tax cuts for the wealthy and, despite sixteen years of Democratic rule, the trajectory has been downhill ever since.

Having destroyed America’s middle class, stretched income inequality to ludicrous extremes and purchased the two major political parties, the wealthy elites are surely enjoying the spectacle we serfs naively call a democratic election. The reality is, they don’t care who is crowned President. The oily, snake-tongued Trump is one of their members, as is the neo-liberal Clinton. Neither candidate is a threat to the current hegemony that is pulling this country beneath the surface like a weight tied around its ankles.

The corporate media dutifully continues its assigned goal of making the Presidential campaign look like a race when it is actually more like a horrific automobile accident from which we can’t avert our eyes. Our elections have turned into a dark spectacle, a cirque du macabre of huge laughing orange faces, cackling countesses and obese promoters counting their stacks of coins backstage. We willingly pay the price of admission while they laugh at our gullibility from behind the curtains, filling their vaults with our hard earned cash.

This election year, regardless of who moves into the White House, Americans will lose, and despite being conned once again, their attention will be drawn to the shiny object the media tells them is the next big thing.

A Brand New Short Story: The Invitation

Sometimes actors can get a little too caught up in their roles. That can be especially true if you're filming in a haunted house. Check out "The Invitation" at They're Only Shadows.

The Political Conventions Are Over, But Not Forgotten

Some convention highlights you might have missed:

“Censorship police” wearing yellow vests covered up signs they didn’t agree with and started patriotic chants to drown out protesters.

Signs criticizing the party’s nominee were covered over with huge American flags.

A delegate who hoisted a flag deemed politically inappropriate was thrown out of the convention.

“They tried to bully us, under the assumption that we would all just fall in line,” said one delegate. “We were called crazy, and some of us, including myself, were physically attacked. They tried to intimidate us, but their attempts only fired us up more.”

There you have it. The Republican Convention was an Orwellian nightmare…wait, what? That wasn’t from the Republican Convention? That happened at the Democratic National Convention? Yes, indeed.

Sanders supporters at the convention who did not experience an immediate epiphany and turn their enthusiastic support in the direction of Hillary were harassed, belittled, bullied and, in a few cases, physically assaulted. It was an attempt by the Clinton juggernaut to convey a united Democratic front to the media covering the event, in ways that were as undemocratic as one could possibly get. The Clintonites at the convention went so far as to pay actors to fill up empty seats and cheer for Hillary.

As you might guess, many Sanders supporters went home from the Democratic convention defeated and dismayed by the Trump-like tactics used to shut down protests from the party many thought represented minority voices and the underdogs. That’s so 1960s. Today’s Democratic Party is as beholden to money and special interests as the Republican Party, and is just as ready to stifle descent and discord. Hillary Clinton, with her vast network of rich and famous donors, is the perfect figurehead for a political party that has sold its soul for a shot at the Oval Office, where loyal members can make millions from their experiences.

Luckily for the Democratic Party and Hillary, Trump is the perfect opposition candidate, drawing media attention away from the sleazy tactics and heavy-handed suppression of Sanders with The Donald's daily gaffes and buffoonery. However, the Sanders delegates will remember their treatment at the convention and how the DNC betrayed them, and, with any luck, will take the energy they had for Bernie and build momentum for a new progressive coalition in America.

New Scary Story: Essay: Why I like living in a small town

Small town life in America is often romanticized, but there is a dark side to some rural villages, and you can read about one such town in my new story "Essay: Why I like Living in a Small Town" at That's the Spirit.

If Trump Wins, the Democratic Establishment Will Have Only Itself to Blame

The daily trove of evidence coming from Wikileaks and other sources make it abundantly clear that the DNC, the Hillary campaign and the mainstream media colluded to steal the Democratic primary from Bernie Sanders. Without missing a beat, the media, including some left-leaning outlets, is portraying Bernie supporters at the Democratic convention as spoiled brats who can’t let go of their Quixotic dream, instead of the patriots they are fighting for the soul of the Democratic Party.

Hillary supporters, you can’t have it both ways. You can’t claim to believe in the democratic process and fair elections and then stand behind a candidate who condoned dirty tricks, under-the-table support from the establishment and who accepted money from anyone with an open checkbook. Democrats love to tsk tsk shady Republican tactics that circumvent the democratic process, but refuse to look in the mirror when one of their own commits the same sins.

The irony of ironies of course, is that polls consistently showed that Sanders had the better chance of beating Trump in the general election than did Clinton. So the Democratic establishment, in its myopic quest to ordain the elite-approved candidate, may have cut off its nose to spite its face.

Believe me, the last thing in the world I want to see is Donald Trump taking the Presidential oath of office next January, but if that happens, the Democratic establishment will have only itself to blame. When you play in the same muck and mire as Republicans, you’re not any less dirty because you support a different candidate, and perhaps you’re even a bit more so after decades of claiming the moral high ground.

The Republican National Convention: Send In The Clowns

The only thing missing from last night’s opening of the Republican National Convention was Leni Riefenstahl’s “Triumph of the Will” as the prelude to Donald Trump’s entrance. Hair Trump and the rabid crowd of haters would have felt right at home with the surreal homage to a psychotic dictator.

Did the remaining members of Queen actually give the RNC permission to use “We Are the Champions” at the convention? It’s hard to believe, but if true, I’ll have to plug my ears and “na, na, na,” my way through the inevitable assault of “Bohemian Rhapsody” throughout the remaining years of my life.

One of the big headlines today is the revelation that portions of Melania Trump’s speech last night were lifted from a speech given by Michelle Obama. Is your head spinning too? It’s like Cruella de Vil giving a speech at the American Dog Fighting convention using quotes lifted from Mother Theresa. The only thing more ironically idiotic would have been to plagiarize Hillary Clinton, but never fear, the convention has just started.

And then there was former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s raging, spittle-flecked speech, in which at one point he yelled at the crowd, “Are we crazy?” and they shouted back, “Yes.” The inmates share a brief moment of self-awareness.

Of course, what Republican gathering would be complete without the lies. Lies upon lies upon lies. From Benghazi to Hillary to Obama to Black Lives Matter, conservative barkers spun yarn after yarn, regurgitating the Republican litany of demonstrable falsehoods to a bloodthirsty crowd who live in an alternate reality. The Republican convention is clearly a truth-free zone.

We all like to laugh at conspiracy theorists and religious zealots who constantly predict the end of the world, only to have the target day pass like any other, but you can’t watch the Republican convention without a bit of an uneasy feeling that, should these lunatics gain control of our government, our days on this planet are numbered.

The California Primary Debacle: A Must See Documentary

If you are still under the illusion that your vote counts in an American election, I urge you to take 40 minutes out of your day and watch the short documentary "Uncounted." This doc looks at the myriad ways in which California voters were thwarted at the polls, and how (surprise!) it all seemed to benefit Hillary Clinton. It should be shocking to anyone to learn about how unprepared volunteers are at polling places to answer even the simplest questions, to see how many registered voters were given provisional ballots that weren't counted that Tuesday, to try to comprehend how confusing some of the rules were and how frustrating all of this was for voters.

And the scariest part of all this is that this scenario was probably played out in other states as well. Our system of voting in America is not merely antiquated and confusing, it is being clearly manipulated in a variety of ways, through voter suppression tactics, hacked and corrupted voting machines, and partisan players within each state's voting hierarchy. I hope "Uncounted" disturbs you, because it should. We cannot let this stand.

Anatomy of a Primary: Sanders Got Screwed

To the surprise of no one who supported Bernie Sanders during his primary run, analysis of the voting results by researchers (including a paper by Axel Geijsel of Tilburg University, The Netherlands and Rudolfo Cortes Barragan of Stanford University) show clearly that Sanders was the victim of a rigged system. From our corporate media that virtually ignored Sanders during the early months of his campaign to the Democratic National Committee’s shameless crowning of Clinton long before the votes were counted to the shady dealings of state democratic parties (such as California’s) that aggressively worked to disenfranchise Sanders voters, the deck was stacked against Bernie from the moment he made his announcement to run for the nomination.

While the press was giving the buffoon Donald Trump billions of dollars in free media exposure, it was ignoring Sanders and the huge, enthusiastic crowds he was drawing all across America. My friends, no one has to tell you that this is not how a democracy works.

Related to this is a documentary I just watched this morning called “Spin.” It was made in 1995, but the theme of how the media manipulates the message is as relevant as ever. The filmmaker who made Spin took a very interesting and revealing approach to his subject matter. I didn’t know this, and I don’t know if it’s still true today, but in 1995, you could use a satellite dish to download feeds of raw video taken during television broadcasts of breaks and downtime not edited for broadcast. For example, the Larry King Show was huge in the nineties, and there are numerous clips of Larry talking to guests during commercial breaks.

Anyway, these off-air segments are very revealing in several ways. They clearly show how our news is both overtly and subtly managed, slanted and sanitized for consumption, often not by outright propaganda, but by what’s omitted. The news we see on television is the news the networks and cable companies want us to see to be good little zombie consumers. Spin also shows how political handlers help politicians “spin” uncomfortable topics or questions as they are coached during breaks. And the documentary exposes the sycophantic relationship between television personalities and politicians. Larry King practically polished George HW Bush’s shoes during an interview.

In the twenty years since Spin was released, the news has gone from bad to worse, democracy in America has died and the possibility exists that Donald Trump could become President of the United States. Have a nice day.

Alien Reptile People Are Real, And They're Voting for Trump

I am now thoroughly convinced that a portion of the world’s population is in fact, made up of reptilians from another planet who are able to take human form and call themselves by various names; Evangelical Christians, political conservatives, Dominianists, white nationalists, Nazis, Islamic fundamentalists and Trump supporters. While advanced enough to reach the Earth from their galaxy, their mission is to destroy our planet from within, using an ability to appear in human skin to sew the seeds of their primitive, hateful beliefs among the people living on this blue marble.

How have I comet to accept this remarkable reality? The reactions expressed by the far Right to the Orlando shooting cannot be coming from actual human beings. No born and bred earthling would spew the callous, disgusting, soulless bile that I am reading on various online comment sections. Lead by the orange lizard himself, Donald Trump, the reptilian far right fringe is infesting the Internet with its poisonous rhetoric, blaming the victims and exposing their rotted, maggot riddled souls to the world.

The hypocrisy is beyond real human understanding. Christian fundamentalists who claim they’d like nothing better than a holy war to wipe Islam from the face of the earth, convey their grateful regards to the Muslim who murdered the gays. Come on, people, you’ve got to decide who you hate more, Muslims or gay people. Your wishy-washy attitude weakens your brand. The reality that you cannot face is that you have far more in common with radical Islamists than you do with the American LGBT community.

The tragedy of Orlando has brought the reptiles out from under their rocks to disrupt the grief of tens of millions with inane, inhuman observations that unmask their cold-blooded, brainless nature. Trump and his hateful minions must be sent back into the darkness this November or the reptile invasion of Earth will be complete, and the future of humans doomed. Oh, and apologies to all home-grown reptiles.

Windmills 1, Democracy 0

A note about yesterday’s primary vote here in California that seems to exemplify the shady nature of the Democratic nomination process. Both Katharine and I are registered to vote in California. We both received confirmation of this, and we were sent a card notifying us of where to vote. Despite this, when we went to our polling place, surprise, we weren’t on the list. We were given “provisional” ballots that, instead of going through the machine and being counted, were stuffed in an envelope and ended up god knows where.

Of course, I can’t say if this was the result of any shenanigans on the part of the Democratic Party, but the result is our votes for Sanders were not counted yesterday. Since the beginning of the campaign for the Democratic Presidential nominee, the process has been compromised, controlled and co-opted by the DNC in conjunction with national media outlets to anoint Hillary Clinton the Party’s champion in November.

It’s a no-win situation for Sander’s supporters. Despite the obvious collusion between the Clinton campaign and the DNC, Sander’s supporters who complain will be labeled as sore losers and conspiracy theorists by the corporate media. Using every dirty trick at their disposal, the establishment has won, as it was ordained long ago by America’s elites.

This ugly coronation called a campaign only serves to reinforce the sad reality that America is an oligarchy, a country governed by the rich for the rich, and Clinton is a bona fide, card-carrying member of the ruling class. So far have we fallen that the choice given to us on election day will be between a narcissistic, racist dictator-in-waiting and a morally bankrupt, money-worshipping tool of the elites.

I thank Bernie Sanders for taking on the hapless job of attacking the windmills. Though the odds were always against you, you fought courageously and for all the right reasons.

I Understand the Futility of Voting in a Rigged System

So this morning I went through the motions of voting.  I say, “went through the motions” because yesterday, one of the major news services made the announcement that, based on information from the nefarious and undemocratic Superdelegates, Hillary Clinton had wrapped up the Democratic nomination for the Presidency. The announcement, timed conveniently the Monday night before the California and other primaries, is one more example of the political establishment hijacking the democratic process to essentially install their candidate as the nominee.

This Presidential campaign cycle has already shown a glaring light on our broken electoral system. Yes there’s Donald Trump, but the problems I’m talking about are systemic issues that run across party lines to rig the election in favor of America’s elites, whatever their party. This campaign season the DNC has pulled out all the stops to assure Wall Street, K Street and every street lined with multi-million dollar homes that they will have one of their own sitting in the White House come January.  The one percent can let out a sigh of relief knowing it will be business as usual for the next four years under Clinton, that greed will be rewarded and short-term profits over long-term stability will still be the order of the day.

The only hope is that the Sanders revolution will continue rolling on past the election, and that it will have energized young people to stay in the trenches and fight for progressive ideals and candidates. We need to cultivate younger candidates to run for offices at all levels of government around the country and start making inroads into the old boy’s network that has a stranglehold on our democratic institutions. Had this been a truly democratic election, Sanders would have won, but the fight can’t stop here in defeat, but must move on and grow stronger and smarter for the next battle.

Humanity’s Way Forward: Competition or Contributionism?

Over the past few weeks I’ve been sliding down the rabbit hole of some very esoteric and controversial subject matter – the Sumerians, alternative history, the origins of religious texts – and I came across a very interesting guy named Michael Tellinger.  A South African, Tellinger is an author, researcher and speaker whose area of exploration is extremely controversial and includes a mysterious tenth planet called Niburu, actual giants on earth in our ancient past and the incredibly advanced Sumerians, who were responsible for such “firsts” as the first schools, the first proverbs and sayings, the first messiahs, the first Noah and the Flood stories, the first legal precedents in court cases, the first tale of a dying and resurrected god, the first funeral chants, first moral ideas and the first concept of time, among other achievements.

If you haven’t already rolled your eyes and moved on at this point, I appreciate your openness and thank you for hanging in there. Let’s set aside Tellinger’s more controversial historical conclusions for a moment, because out of his research and studies, he has created an organization called the Ubuntu Liberation Movement. I’m new to this, and if you want to know more about it just google the name, but the movement’s goals as I understand them are to create societies from the ground up designed to release humans from the systems and traditions that keep us more or less emotionally and spiritually enslaved (to the benefit of the worlds elites), and this includes money.

Tellinger argues that money, which also originated in Sumeria, was created as a way to control and suppress human interaction and, as we can clearly see today, is the force that allows the one percent, a tiny fraction of the population, to control the wealth of the world, and our quality of life. Tellinger envisions communities that do not use money, but rely on the latent and learned talents of all community members for success, and are guided by the simple principal, “if it’s not good for everyone, it’s not good at all.” Anyway, if it’s of interest to you, check out their site. What I want to discuss further is Tellinger’s (and my own) views on competition.

In Western societies, the idea that competition is a normal and natural aspect of human life has been drilled into us for ages. War is the ultimate competition, deciding who gets what plot of land and ruling rights. From Gladiator fights to Darwin to baseball’s World Series to who gets the corner office, the concept that competition is normal and necessary to human progress is now simply taken for granted today. Tellinger, however, says no, competition is actually destructive and demeaning, and is counterproductive to real human progress. He argues that collaboration that incorporates contributionism, not competition, is the key to our future survival.

Tellinger is certainly not the first person to point out the problems with competition, but it still seems like a revolutionary idea to many people. Just one look at the current situation on planet Earth, however, should convince anyone that this is not really a controversial concept at all.

A major problem with competition versus contributionism is that when you compete for something, you are far more likely to fail than to win. Just as in Vegas, the odds are always against you. In most cases, there’s only one winner who gets the coveted job, who can hold up the gold trophy, who is able to deposit the big check. The vast majority of us are simply expected to accept our status as losers and move on with our lives. In addition, what we face under present day capitalism is not a level playing field where everyone gets an equal chance to succeed, but a highly rigged system where past winners already have tremendous advantages over the rest of us. The elites who control things – the banks, Wall Street, world capitals – are continuously perpetuating the myth that competition is the natural order of the world, all to their continuing advantage, and our continuing enslavement.

Contributionism, according to Tellinger, is the way to break the cycle of oppression and truly realize what it means to be human. And what are our options? Our current course is leading the human race to self-destruction. Can we put any hope in the idea that our ruling elites with their powerful institutions will somehow have a change of heart and begin working in the interests of the masses? We all know the answer to that.

Tellinger’s ideas are radical, and his Ubuntu Liberation Movement is certainly below the radar of most people, but I believe there are only two paths humans can take at this point in history: One is to continue on our current march of endless war and conflict perpetuated by the elites for their own gain or two, start from scratch. A new way forward for humanity has to come from the bottom up, one community at a time. Tellinger’s idea of a collaborative society unshackled from money and competition may not be the answer, but to me it seems like a compelling start.

New Short Scary Story: The Love Interest

Having a stalker is bad, but having to work with that person would be a nightmare. Find out more at They're Only Shadows.

The Obama Administration: One Step Forward, One Step Back

I’ve always liked Obama as a person, good sense of humor, not a privileged white male, and tried to like him as a President, but it seems like for every step forward his administration takes, there is a corresponding step back. Just a couple of days ago, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, gave an impassioned speech in support of the rights of the LGBT community and lashed out at North Carolina governor Pat McCrory and other governors who are attempting to legally discriminate against gay and transgender Americans.  One step forward and two thumbs up from me.

So what does the Obama administration do next? It turns around and gives war criminal and mass murderer Henry Kissinger the highest honor that the Department of Defense can bestow on a civilian: a Distinguished Public Service Award. This is the man who is responsible for as many as 4 million deaths in three countries. Kissinger’s approval of the illegal bombing of Cambodia in the 1970s set a precedent of international law-breaking and violence that every subsequent President has taken advantage of, including the Nobel Peace Prize recipient Barack Obama.

Kissinger should be sharing a jail cell with Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld for crimes against humanity, not receiving medals. One step back.

Trump is the Republican Party Stripped Naked

I find the hair pulling and garment rending by the Republican establishment over Donald Trump becoming their presidential candidate hilarious and totally disingenuous. You would guess from all of the wailing that Trump had somehow betrayed the Republican Party’s core values or insulted Ronald Reagan, but that’s not what’s going on here. Most of Trumps ideas and ideals are straight from the Republican playbook (“The Art of the Lie”) and probably differ little from Rubio or Kasich or McConnell. So why is Mr. Combover despised by so many in his own party?

Republicans are upset with Trump because he dared to break the golden rule of conservatives campaigning for office: Always talk in code. The Code is a laundry list of words and phrases used by Republicans to convey their true values to the faithful without coming across to the rest of us as obviously racist, homophobic, misogynistic or cruel. For instance, when a politician talks about those who have become dependent on welfare or “the takers” or welfare queens, they’re talking about African Americans. If they talk about people attacking America’s core values, waging war against Christmas or East Coast elites, they’re referring to liberals. And when they talk about almost any issue relating to women, the real message is “we must maintain America’s patriarchy at any cost.”

Trump, however, ain’t playing that game. He has thrown away the codebook and blurts out what every racist, misogynistic, homophobic American wants to hear in one and two syllable words. No more talking in code for Trump. He’s going to tell it like it is, and his fellow Republicans are outraged because their horrible, hateful values are now on full display in every Trump speech and interview.

Trump is the Republican Party naked, revealing every ugly blemish, every deformity, every open sore and it is a truly an ugly spectacle. Mainstream Republicans don’t hate Donald for what he says, but for how he says it, and in the end, it might be the one positive thing to come out of Trump’s run for the White House.

Is Science Picking Up Where Religion Leaves Off?

One of the most profound questions humans have pondered since they were able to ponder is the nature of reality.  Is reality the sum of what we can experience through our senses and nothing more or are there worlds that exist beyond the tiny bubble in which we live that can only be experienced under certain conditions, like meditation, prayer, psychedelic drugs or the death of the body?

At some point in our past, and archeological discoveries keep pushing that date farther and farther back in time, humans began worshiping the unknowable  — a creator, nature in all its beauty and cruelty, ancestors, the mystery of death and the purpose, if there was one, of our lives. Religion was born as a way to try and make sense of an existence that seemed otherwise meaningless. Early humans sensed that there was something beyond day-to-day survival and, even though they had no idea what it was, began to create stories to explain the unfathomable in terms others could understand, to try and bring some meaning to our existence on this planet.

Fast-forward to the twenty-first century. Religion is, of course, still a significant factor for billions of humans world-wide, and, unfortunately, continues to be a source (or excuse) for violence in many spots on the planet. In the developed world, especially in Scandinavia and western Europe, organized religion is losing its hold on each new generation. Take Sweden, for example. In a 2009 Gallup Pole, a mere 17% of respondents answered “yes” to the question, “Is religion an important part of your daily life?” However, lack of interest in organized religion doesn’t necessarily mean non-belief. In another 2010 poll, 45% of Swedes asked said they believed in some sort higher spiritual power.

The same trend is happening in the United States, although you wouldn’t know it by listening to the mainstream press or the Republican Presidential race.  Millennials are far less religious than their parents, and there is no reason to believe this won’t continue to be the case with every succeeding generation. So while the beginning of the end of organized religion is taking place in western countries, a second phenomena is just underway that ironically may scientifically prove that the mystics, seers and shamans were right all along — reality is not merely what we can see, hear and touch, but exists not separate from our consciousness, but as a result of our consciousness, and may very well exist in other dimensions.

The work of Dr. Adam Lanza, captured in his book, Biocentrism, offers an intriguing theory about the essence of reality that stretches back at least as far as Decartes, the French philosopher, but, he claims, is being confirmed today by experiments in quantum physics.  Lanza believes that “there is no independent external universe outside of biological existence,” and “that what we call space and time are forms of animal sense perception, rather than external physical objects.” In other words, our universe, our reality, is a creation of our consciousness, not the other way around. Lanza’s understanding of quantum physics far exceeds mine, but in his book he explains how certain experiments are showing that elemental particles behave differently depending on whether they are being observed or not.

Other experiments in quantum physics are causing physicists to seriously debate the existence of multiple dimensions that exist within or along side our own. So science is just beginning to unlock the complexity of what we call reality and discovering that it does indeed extends beyond what we see, feel and touch on a daily basis into previously unseen realms.

My own views on religion and the “unseen realms” have changed over the years. I have been in and out of organized religion during my life, but over the past three decades, I would characterize myself as an agnostic teetering on the cliff of atheism. I never made the final leap into the chasm of absolute non-belief because, like most human beings, as much as I tried, I couldn’t convince myself that life is meaningless and death is the absolute end. And I feel I am even now stepping back farther from the cliff’s edge after being exposed to the theories of Lanza and other scientists.

Let me add a personal observation. Humans are, of course, animals. We share characteristics of all mammals, with one distinction; our cognitive abilities. For reasons that could fill a library, human brains have developed thinking skills far beyond the capacity of other mammals, resulting in great cities, poetry, medicine, and Pop Tarts. Our minds (and opposable thumbs) allow us to do amazing things that exceed not only the abilities of our fellow mammals, but their reality, as well.

So one day I decide I want to teach a cow about photography. I go to a field with my laptop, sit down in front of Elsie, and begin explaining to her everything I can find related to photography. I do this 24/7 for ten years. At the end of this time, Elsie moos and moves on to greener pastures. Elsie’s cognitive capabilities are simply not developed enough to even understand my words, let alone the concept of photography. To her, I would simply be some type of annoying animal making noises. My point is, photography is outside of Elsie’s understanding of the world, so it is not a part of her reality and therefore doesn’t exist. This would be true for all non-human mammals. Even though photography does exist in the same world as the cow, it does not exist for the cow.

So why couldn’t this be true of humans? Isn’t it possible that there are beings, knowledge, worlds, even within our reality, that are simply beyond our ability to understand, and therefore, do not exist to us? And perhaps humans occasionally catch a glimpse of the unknowable through dreams or drugs or near death experiences. It’s exciting to think that science is now opening the door a crack to a new understanding of the complexities and mysteries of reality at the same time our belief systems are losing their relevance.  We may be coming to a point where science will take us to places and realizations as amazing as any story we can possibly dream up.

Broken Hand

Broke two bones in my left hand a week ago so my postings will be sparse until the cast comes off in three weeks :-(

The Neighbor - Newest short scary story

How well do you really know your neighbors? This latest short scary story, "The Neighbor" might inspire you to keep a closer eye on the people next door.