Contrary to the Hobbesian prediction of anarchy (freedom) and brutish or unproductive results in the event that elites (often termed ‘beneficent paternalism’) aren’t fostered: we find lots of evidence that team play and open organizational structure actually creates more civilized and productive governance. Lincoln Electric in Cleveland is a well-documented example of how sharing the wealth and responsibility builds communication and profit. A Brazilian city named Porto Allegro that opened itself to citizen involvement and socialist ideals is flourishing as corruption wanes. It was predicted they would fail financially but more than a decade of good results has been the outcome. Singapore reduces government as a percentage of GDP and is fully modernized. Instead of ‘expertise’ being the solution, it might well be these technocrats in bureaucracies are the problem.

Archaeology Magazine has a frequent contributor named Professor Wiseman who comes under our critical gaze for all his fine ‘expertise’. He truly has struck a sore spot in our view of what is real about the Runestone at Kensington. Most importantly he did his duty just after he was proven wrong in a conference of ‘experts’ from many of his own colleagues as well as other disciplines. It was February, 2001 when we read his ‘Camelot in Kentucky’ attack on the most speculative of all articles that hit the newsstands in early 2001, about Europeans in America or Diffusionist History. Shortly thereafter this organ of the gods of archaeology had a piece on the natural landforms of the desert that became the Sphinx and Pyramids. No credit due to man and science in ancient times is allowed, it seems. In fact all of us are mere ‘post-modern speculative’ trash as he would have it. We hit the ceiling and laughed simultaneously. Let’s allow his own words to prove our point (again).

“Perhaps unwittingly, Stengel follows in the footsteps of the hyper-diffusionists, raising old hoaxes exposed long ago. He brings up once again the Kensington, Minnesota, Rune Stone with its account of Scandinavian visitors in 1392, which over the past century has been repeatedly rejected as a forgery by scholars, most recently by Stephen Williams, a curator emeritus of Harvard’s Peabody Museum, in his book Fantastic Archaeology…

Refutation of baseless speculation {That is YOU, if you are thinking!} and repeated resurrection of previously exposed frauds and forgeries is a seemingly endless task. So it seems to the teachers who must explain year after year to new groups of students that reports of Celtic inscriptions in the Precolumbian Midwest or Phoenicians in Brazil are false. The problem is aggravated by a spreading notion in Western society that all opinions should be given equal weight and are valid until proven wrong. In this Post-Modern democratization of ideas, utter speculation by the uninformed ranks alongside the reasoned hypotheses of scholars and other experts in the field.”(9)

The Midwest Archaeology Conference held at the Radisson in St. Paul, Minnesota in the November before this article was printed found a completely different and more complete investigational answer. They had only one ‘debunker’ dissenter who thought Wiseman might be right. The historian with the records from the royal court of Norway. The top linguist who showed the flaws in earlier scholarship. No one alive at the time this stone was discovered could have known what information was held within the syntax and vernacular usages of the time it actually was written or inscribed. It was shortly thereafter that scholars saw these things yet it has been a hundred years and many books have been written. Three questionable witnesses have said their father or grandfather forged the stone. I guess you could liken them to jailhouse confessions but why did they need three different ‘confessors’ when only one did it in each case? The chemical engineer and all the other archaeologists present at this meeting were engaged in “utter speculation by the uninformed ranks” according to Prof. Wiseman and Archaeology Magazine.

There are people today engaged in ridiculing Farley Mowat because he is showing how the Scots of St. Albans came here before the Norse (if there is any difference between Pictish Scots and Gothic Norse) who settled L’Anse-aux-Meadows. You would think these people would know when they are beat, but the BIG LIE affects a large percentage of people who never really evaluate the facts. Mowat was a key factor in the battle to get the Norse point of view across in his book Westviking. One such ridiculer or paid hatchetman said Mowat has no experience in the north of the Canadian Arctic. My oldest brother’s first wife’s father was a missionary in the Arctic before becoming a Chartered Accountant. He lived with Farley for two years there. Farley came to our lake and visited, but I never met him. Let me assure you the experts often have no integrity. Their example is part of the reason why our kids lie and cheat (on tests in American schools, Reader’s Digest said 78% ADMIT cheating.) or grow up to be lawyers and politicians.

By: Robert Baird

About the Author:

Education is a social process; Education is growth;
Education is not preparation for life; Education is life itself. — John Dewey

The prosperity of a country depends not on the abundance of its revenues, not on the strength of its fortifications, not on the beauty of its public buildings; but it consists in the number of its cultivated citizens, in its men of education, enlightenment and character. —martin Luther.

If wealth is lost nothing is lost.
If health is lost something is lost.
If character is lost everything is lost. —M.K. Gandhi (Father of Indian Nation)

Value is a conception, explicit, distinctive of an individual or characteristic of a group of the desirable which influences the selection from available, means and ends of action.

Values are the desirable ends, goals or modes of action which makes human behaviour selective. Value not only orients but also determines human behaviour.

Classification of Values:
It is necessary to know types of values. It is necessary to improve values in the children.

1. Gail M. Inlaw Classification

* Traditional and cultural values

* Economic values

* Political values

* Values in science and technology

* Philosophical values

* Values of the new left

* Values of the back community

2. Spranger’s Classification:

* Theoretical values

* Economic values

* Aesthetic values

* Social values

* Political values

* Religious values

3. Ploto’s Classification:

* Truth

* Beauty

* Goodness

4. Parker’s Classification of Values:

* Biological values

* Economic values

* Affective values

* Social values

* Intellectual values

* Aesthetic values

* Moral values

* Religious value

5. Gandhi’s Classification:

* Truth

* Non-violence

* Freedom

* Democracy

* Equality

* Self-realization

* Purity of ends and means

* Self-discipline

6. B.R. Goel Classification: ( Documents on Social, Moral and Spiritual Values)

1. Abstinence

2. Anti-touch ability

3. Consideration for others

4. Co-operation

5. Compassion

6. Common good

7. Courtesy

8. Democratic decision making

9. Dignity of the individual

10. Duty

11. Endurance

12. Friendship

13. Fellow-feeling

14. Forward look

15. Gentlemanliness

16. Honesty

17. Appreciation

18. Citizenship

19. Concern for others

20. Cleanliness

21. Common cause

22. Courage

23. Curiosity

24. Devotion

25. Dignity of manual work

26. Discipline

27. Quality

28. Faithfulness

29. Freedom

30. Good manner

31. Gratitude

32. Helpfulness

33. Humanism

34. Initiative

35. Justice

36. Kindness to animals

37. Leadership

38. National consciousness

39. National integration

40. Peace

41. Punctuality

42. Purity

43. Resourcefulness

44. Respect for others

45. Sincerity

46. Social justice

47. Self-help

48. Self-confidence

49. Self-study

50. Self-control

51. Social service

52. Sense of discrimination between good and bad

53. Socialism

54. Secularism and respect for all religions

55. Team work

56. Truthfulness

57. Universal truth

58. Value for national and civic property

59. Hygienic living

60. Integrity

61. Kindness

62. Loyalty to duty

63. National unity

64. Non- violence

65. Obedience

66. Proper utilization of time

67. Patriotism

68. Quest for knowledge

69. Regularity

70. Reverence for old age

71. Simple living

72. Self-discipline

73. Self- respect

74. Self-support

75. Self- reliance

76. Self-restraint

77. Solidarity of mankind

78. Sense of social responsibility

79. Sympathy

80. Spirit of enquiry

81. Team spirit

82. Tolerance

83. Universal love

7. In generally, values may be classified as personal, social moral, spiritual and behavioural values.

By: Naraginti Reddy

About the Author:

It is time to cease the argument regarding Socialism versus Capitalism and begin the movement towards Peace and Prosperity.

10 years ago, I was at Fuji Bank in the New York headquarters of what was then the largest bank in the world, in charge of corporate finance for the leading companies of that time. With support from the governments of Japan and other Asian countries, we were succeeding in the fight against the Asian financial crisis and rescuing troubled companies. However, we faced strong objections from the USA, and were criticized as having departed from the capitalist free economy competition principle. We were called socialists. The USA requested that Japan reduce government expenses and national debt, allowing the free market to eliminate poorly performing enterprises and punish the responsible executives. As a result, many leading world companies declared bankruptcy and numerous employees lost their jobs. Many CEO’s and other executives committed suicide, or were prosecuted and subsequently sentenced.

Now that a financial crisis has swept the USA, the government has taken completely different actions which included taking control of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, taking over AIG, along with Washington Mutual and the top three investment banks, and relatively quickly passed the passed the $700 billion bailout plan.

Those actions prompted criticism from academia along with the media, as demonstrated by the following headlines:

Socialism creates a defining moment in American capitalism,
Socialism for Wall Street, Free Market Capitalism for Everybody Else
We’ve Crossed the Line from Capitalism to Socialism
Bush brings socialism to citadel of capitalism
Socialism, Capitalism, the Free-Market and the Future of America
The world crisis of capitalism and the prospects for socialism
From Capitalism to Socialism to ???: Crossing the Line Et cetera…

However, these accusations were utterly disregarded, resulting in absolutely no influence on the government’s decisions.

It is obvious that when it comes down to it, no one is willing to sacrifice his or her current success and own wellbeing to make a statement in the esoteric war against the hundred-year-old definition of socialism.

In 1980s, the new reforms and open policy developed by Deng Xiaoping’s leadership created a new era in China’s history. During this time, I introduced western economics and explained the workings of capitalism to socialist China, and facilitated China’s top decision-making. When I made a speech to Chinese leaders and scholars in Beijing in 1985, I most particularly emphasized, “Do not struggle – regardless of whether a policy is nominally dubbed Socialism or Capitalism, it must be applied in the race for economic development.” There was a round of applause from the audience.

I criticized the fact that Das Kapital, over 100 years old, still served as the main economics textbook at Chinese universities. Our textbooks dismissed Western countries’ scientific macroeconomic theory, consummation, government management mechanism, the macro-control function, and the extremely strict laws and regulations monitoring system, and still focused on market economy, free economy, and other age-old simple models in order to describe contemporary Western economy.

I indicated, “Economy, information, and society change with each new day, and the financial market is developing. As the result, Marxist Economics and Keynes Economics are difficult to relate to in light of the current economy. They can only serve as great historical milestones, not as modern ideas.”

China’s 30 year’s reform/open policy, which disregarded and dismissed arguments of socialism or capitalism and instead kept pace with the times and scientific developments resulted in great economic achievements.

Instead of pointlessly arguing over how socialist or capitalist something is, we need to focus on key economic issues. Specifically, the funding source and usage for the huge bailout plan. Increasing tax or debt is not an easy route. If we don’t have enough funds, the plan will be only a blank check from politicians to voters during this election year. We need to learn from the similar experience Japan faced in resolving the financial crisis ten years ago.

The concept that socialism is disastrous is outdated and obsolete. This time, the financial crisis has awoken Americans, many of whom did not focus on economic issues prior to this unprecedented situation. We need to cease debating about Socialism versus Capitalism and instead concentrate on moving towards a more peaceful country and safer people. We should take heed the wisdom of Deng Xiaoping’s adage: I don’t care if the cat is white or black, as long as it catches mice.

By: Dr. Fengbo Zhang

About the Author:

Tradition is a powerful, albeit often inaccurate source for Truth. Many Christians may be offended hearing that the birth of Jesus was NOT 25 December. We present evidence from Scripture and The Law indicating that date as most likely inaccurate. We propose instead of our familiar “Christmas,” a Jewish Holiday, Rosh Hashanah, for that Holy Event. We hope readers agree that evidence points in favor of the latter.

Judaic Law was applied when Jesus began His ministry. Talmud Aboth 8:21 rules Jewish men are “at full strength” at age thirty years. That is, they are “at the prime of life” at that age. This ruling appears to be reasoned not so much from Scripture, but more likely it seems from tradition. Joseph was placed in charge of Pharaoh’s wealth at age thirty. Also, David was made King of Israel at age thirty. Jesus then apparently held to the “traditional” age of “strength in maturity” when He preached in the Capernaum synagogue. (Luke 4:17 – 21) Most scholars assume Jesus was age thirty at that time, and continued His ministry until He was 33 1/2 years of age at His “Death.”

At the very beginning of Jesus’ ministry, He was chosen from among the men of the congregation to read a portion of Scripture, Isaiah 61, in the synagogue of His hometown, Nazareth. (Luke 4:16 – 21) At each Sabbath morning service, one man of the congregation is asked to read from what is known as the HafTorah. Scripture selected for reading is from the Prophets and reflects upon the Word read first as a portion (Sedrah) from the Torah on that specific Jewish calendar Sabbath or Feast Day. Chapter III of Megillah tractate details protocol and procedures for reading portions of Torah, continuing this practice in synagogues today as well.

The HafTorah is to be chanted immediately after reading the Torah portion for that week. Rabbis reason that, because Moses received those words directly from the Lord, Torah then has precedence over books of the prophets, as well as all other portions of Scripture.

The HafTorah, with but few exceptions, has a relationship to that Torah portion which had just been concluded in the reading. An example illustrating the relationship interpreted to exist between the Sedrah and its accompanying HafTorah is shown for Numbers 18 as follows:

A comparison is made through similarity of the plights of Moses (in the Sedrah) and Samuel in the HafTorah, which for that day is I Samuel 11:1 – 11 through I Samuel 12:22. In “The Pentateuch and Haftorahs,” Rabbi J. H. Hertz reports that the People had “murmured” unjustly at the leadership of Moses. Samuel encountered the same type of disgruntled populace as he attempted to build the nation as the last of Israel’s Judges; whereas, the people instead wanted to be led by a “King” (Saul). Prophets and sages expected a King to be a shepherd of his people, whose authority would maintain peace, liberty, compassion and righteousness – such as God would do!

One favorite Judaism source observes that to be assigned the public reading of the HafTorah is a great honor. The assignment further augments the honor in that it identifies the reader as a Jew who has reached a significant level in Jewish knowledge, such as a graduate from a Yeshiva. The reader must be able to read Hebrew fluently and to chant the words exactly to the prescribed musical notes, intonations and rhythms. – No doubt can exist that Jesus could do this Perfectly! – Nazareth’s congregation could never have made a better selection for the HafTorah reading – especially on that Day!

It is stated4that even at times when the HafTorah does not have a direct reference to the Sedrah for that day, still it is intended to reinforce the teaching of the weekly reading on the minds of worshipers by a prophetic message of Consolation and Hope! That is precisely the kind of message Jesus delivered to his assembled “peers.” He was effectively informing His neighbors and friends from His growing years in Nazareth that their long awaited Redeemer was standing in their midst that very day! – as He read His assigned portion from Isaiah 61 and beginning at Verse 1, as quoted in Luke 4:18 19,-

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He hath anointed Me to preach the Gospel to the poor; He hath sent Me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering the sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised. To preach the acceptable year of the Lord…”

And, at that point in the Scripture, Jesus halted before completing Isaiah 61:2 and verses following, instead rolling up the scroll and concluding by saying, from Luke 4:21,

“…This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears.”

We, of course, cannot imagine the shock and perplexity His declaration brought to those attending that synagogue service!

The remainder of this HafTorah would have included Verses 2 through 11 of the Isaiah portion, completing the chapter. Jesus omitted those remaining verses of course because they are not to be fulfilled until after Jesus returns to Redeem Israel and to establish His Kingdom when He arrives at the Mount of Olives “on that Day.” Later, neighbors and peers accused this son of Joseph, the carpenter, of blasphemy and attempted to throw Him to His death from a cliff – which, by-the-way, still stands today at the outskirts of the worldly Socialist city of Nazareth in Galilee. (Luke 4:22 – 30)

One Jewish source presents the Isaiah 61 HafTorah to be read as a message of consolation on the Sabbath prior to Rosh Hashanah. The notation says this passage ties in with that season of Holy days and with the Sedrah that challenges Israel “to make a choice for life and for God.” Moreover, this note points out, poignantly from Isaiah 62:5, this relationship declares: “as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will God rejoice over you.”

It is interesting in our modern times to observe that this HafTorah reading Jesus brought to His congregation, now has been reduced by Jewish teachers to include only the verses 10 and 11 from Isaiah’s Chapter 61. It would seem that the Rabbis have read Luke 4:18-19 and prefer to avoid any reference to someone once having “fulfilled this Scripture in their ears”!.-We must concede that it is not at all certain that Jesus had read this HafTorah from Isaiah 61 on the Sabbath preceding Rosh Hashanah. During the fourth century Rabbi Hillel II, last President of the Sanhedrin, made some rather obscure and untraceable changes to the Jewish calendar and order of worship. Nevertheless, it is strongly implied just from the context of these verses that a relationship to the New Year exists.

Further confirmation of the date at or near Rosh Hashanah is suggested from the opinion of many Christian scholars that the Earthly Ministry of Jesus lasted three-and one-half years. From this we confirm a calendar difference of six-months between the starting date, at Rosh Hashanah, about September or October, and completion of His ministry as a “Mortal” on Passover, about March or April. He therefore must have started it three and one half years earlier on Rosh Hashanah, since those two Feast holidays are separated by six months on the Jewish calendar.

Evidence that the birth of Jesus was on Rosh Hashanah, instead of 25 December, is not conclusive; although it does appear to have significant support from Scripture, the Law and Talmudic tradition.

By: Robert Reiland

About the Author:

A mouth that prays, a hand that kills.

- Arabian proverb

“How do you find a lion that has swallowed you?” asked Swiss psychologist, Carl Jung, commenting on the moral dilemma posed by the “shadow,” his insightful term for the dark, hidden side of the human psyche.

The answer to Jung’s questions is “you can’t find or see that lion”–not as long as you are inside the beast. And therein resides the essential dilemma of a group’s dark side or shadow: it is nearly impossible for those caught inside a group’s belief system to see their own dark side with any clarity or objectivity. This hidden side grows over time, regressing, becoming more and more aggressive. It’s the “long bag we drag behind us,” says poet Robert Bly–where, as individuals, we dispose of all those things that are too uncomfortable to look at. “The long-repressed shadow of Dr. Jekyll rises up in the shape of Mr. Hyde, deformed, an ape-like figure glimpsed against the alley wall.” Now imagine millions of Mr. Hydes and you have a sense of the group shadow of fundamentalist, right wing extremists dressed up as “compassionate conservatives,” led by George W. Bush. It’s like shifting from a hand gun to a nuclear bomb. And it began long ago in both the Moslem and Christian worlds.
The invasion of American Democratic institutions by fundamentalist, historically militant (as in crusades, witch hunts, inquisitions, and support of slavery) Christianity has significantly increased the stench coming from the already disturbing dark side of U.S. politics. It’s like a nightmarish replay of the Christian crusades–politics with a militant, convert-the-heathens dark side. Potent, cult-like group dynamics combine with unacknowledged and unseen shadow qualities to easily overwhelm the individual’s sense of right and wrong, often unleashing pure evil en masse.

As the political world and the media divided the U.S. into red and blue states, I found myself feeling uncomfortable even thinking about driving through one of those “red” states. I would imagine that every red-state person must be a card-carrying, right wing fundamentalist. From the other side of the mountain, those “blue” states are full of liberal, soft-on-terrorism, big government socialists. Both are examples of projecting our group’s shadow onto the “enemy.” And both views prevent us from “seeing” individual human beings. We see only that group, those people. With remarkable ease, we slide into a “programmed,” either-or, group-think: we’re the good guys, they’re the bad guys. It’s like seeing everything through red or blue-tinted glasses that color all we see and think–we’ve been “swallowed.”

Group shadow dynamics can shift the focus of our beliefs with stunning speed to another “evil” enemy. Petty dictators are convenient “hooks” on which groups often hang their collective shadow, their dirty laundry; a perfect example being Saddam Hussein who, in 1990-1991 magically transitioned from being a relatively obscure U.S. ally (receiving military aid, weapons, satellite intelligence, and high tech equipment) into an incarnation of evil and a dire threat to humanity that we had to eliminate. Such is the hypnotic power of group paranoia combined with propaganda in stirring up a nationalistic, lynch mob mentality. In 1986, an article about Don Rumsfeld in the Chicago Tribune listed helping “re-open U.S. relations with Iraq” as one of his career achievements when he served as Reagan’s special envoy to the Middle East. The State Department reported that while Rumsfeld was opening relations with Iraq, Saddam Hussein was murdering thousands of Kurds using chemical weapons.

Once a belief system gains control, those beliefs are much more likely to move us to action, propel us into roles and conduct we would never contemplate on our own. Voltaire warned, “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” Moreover, under the influence of any fundamentalist ideology, beliefs (often paranoid and delusional) tend to override facts–a very dangerous mental environment for making life and death decisions, or declaring war. Independent critical thinking and logic–qualities that are most threatening to any destructive group–expose absurdities. Consider this excerpt from a speech by the Nazi Party leader Rudolph Hess on June 30, 1934: “The National Socialism of all of us is anchored in uncritical loyalty…” (my italics). “What good fortune for those in power that people do not think,” observed Hitler, who knew that thinking citizens were a real danger to his political ambitions.

Ignorance of the group shadow and its destructive consequences locks us into a mutually destructive embrace with our “enemies.” In a perverse way each side needing the other–an ironic, group co-dependency on the others “evil” in order to perpetuate themselves. Thus the twisted rationale for a never-ending “War on Terror” that is the mirror image of the never-ending Islamic Jihad against the West. The president made this unending mission clear when he announced, “There’s no telling how many wars it will take to secure freedom in the homeland.” The notion of permanent war against a designated “evil” or “tyranny” is a classic dark side of Christian fundamentalism that mimics the Moslem worlds’ fundamentalist doctrine that declares non-Moslem countries as “Dar-al-Harb,” which means “The Home of War.” It’s no surprise to realize that George W’s fundamentalist dark side also echoes Islamic fundamentalism’s oft-stated goal of a global Moslem theocracy, which a prominent Iranian ayatollah made perfectly clear: “It will . . . be the duty of every able-bodied adult male to volunteer for this war of conquest, the final aim of which is to put Koranic law in power from one end of the earth to the other.”

Sounding a lot like a description of our current world situation, Erasmus (d. 1536), a peaceful, educated, psychologically savvy, Catholic humanist observed: “There is no injury, however insignificant it may be which does not seem to them [Christians] sufficient pretext to start a war. They suppress and hide everything that might maintain peace; they exaggerate excessively everything that would lead to an outbreak of war.” In his book, People of the Lie, author M. Scott Peck explains the slippery nature of good and evil. He points out that “evil people are often destructive because they are trying to destroy evil. Instead of destroying others they should be destroying the sickness within themselves.” This paradox is similar to Jung’s observation that “a so-called good to which we succumb loses its ethical character,” meaning that we paradoxically facilitate evil when we become one-sided, when we believe our group is on the side of goodness and virtue. When one-sided, a so-called quest for peace inevitably produces a group shadow filled with aggression and violence.

This one-sided, assumed superiority or “elitism” is at the core of the Bush administration’s dark side, especially their pretentious, religious and political elitism. George W’s elite base includes the wealthy and the powerful. They are the hidden people he really represents, those economically “elite,” special interest bosses he described so accurately in a speech at one of his private, campaign fund raising dinners: “You’re my base: the haves and the have mores.” They must have been some of the people he was referring to at a 2002 meeting with his economic squad about a second round of tax cuts: “Haven’t we already given money to rich people?”

You know a group’s shadow is active when “…our belief is in the republic and the republic is declared endangered,” explains author and psychologist James Hillman. “Whatsoever the object of belief–the flag, the nation, the president, or the god–a martial energy mobilizes. Decisions are quick, dissent more difficult. Doubt which impedes action and questions certitude becomes traitorous, an enemy to be silenced.” “The greatest purveyor of violence in the world today… is my own nation,” observed Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., who practiced nonviolent social and political change. Shakespeare (in Julius Caesar) eloquently described the bright facade of this fundamentalist, political shadow in his play about another “super power”: And let us bathe our hands in . . . blood up to the elbows, and besmear our swords. Then we walk forth, even to the market place, and waving our red weapons o’er our heads, let’s all cry “peace, freedom and liberty!”

“There will never be world peace until God’s house and God’s people are given their rightful place of leadership at the top of the world,” proclaimed Christian fundamentalist Pat Robertson. The Treaty of Tripoli (1797), carried unanimously by the Senate and signed into law by John Adams, contained this statement: “The United States is not a Christian nation any more than it is a Jewish or a Mohammedan nation.” We’ve been here before. The fundamentalist invasion into modern politics has resurrected a nightmarish apparition in the form of Wilsonian political monotheism. We could summarize Wilson’s foreign policy as “the imperative of America’s mission as the vanguard of history, transforming the global order and, in doing so, perpetuating its own dominance,” guided by “the imperative of military supremacy, maintained in perpetuity and projected globally”–all thinly veiled religious elitism and hubris, missionary theology masquerading as “peace, freedom and liberty.” Similarly, in a much applauded speech in 1899, Theodore Roosevelt (just before becoming President) proposed “righteous war” as the sole means of achieving “national greatness.” And, speaking through his group’s fundamentalist “mouth that prays,” Bush made his paranoid mission quite clear: “We will rid the world of the evildoers.”

Like it or not we are stuck in a psychological dilemma fueled by the collision of two toxic groups–groups with deadly shadows created by literalized Christian monotheism and literalized Islamic monotheism–both fundamentalist, both virulent strains of group-think, both after mental territory, economic and political power. One of the symptoms of fanaticism is the belief that one’s mission has been “blessed or even commanded by God,” says Dr. Norman Doidge, professor of psychiatry at the University of Toronto. George W. Bush, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, told Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, “God told me to strike at Al Qaeda and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East.” In every sense of the word, destructive, group-based beliefs are the real weapons of mass destruction that we all need to be very worried about.

“God wanted me to be President,” said George W. Bush. Regarding Iraq, Lieutenant General Boykin recently declared that our “spiritual enemy will only be defeated if we come against them in the name of Jesus.” “We are in a conflict between good and evil, and America will call evil by its name,” Bush declared when announcing his “strategy” for his evangelical, political crusade” Thus, warfare is applied theology. And from either side of the bloody plain, “every war is a just war, a battle between the forces of good and evil,” a ghastly, incurable, repetition–the darkness of utter evil created by what appear to be the noblest of ideals. It creates a culture of immorality governed by hypocrisy, which further reinforces a collective blindness. Hypocrisy, as Hillman points out, “holds the nation together so that it can preach, and practice what it does not preach. It makes possible armories of mass destruction side by side with the proliferation of churches, cults, and charities”–the bright “good” side covering a very destructive dark side.

This fundamentalist, political shadow has become ever more insidious as their ideological assault erodes the constitutional separation of church and state–a separation that marked a stunning acceleration of individual human freedom, establishing a nation that respected the tension between two old enemies: Enlightenment rationalism and organized religion. Americans lived no longer under religious totalitarianism. Instead they lived in an age of religious freedom and an age of reason. America embodied the revolutionary notion that only a clean separation of church and state can guarantee freedom from religious tyranny and true religious freedom.

In 1962 Supreme Court Justice Black described the intent of the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause: Justice Black observed that history had demonstrated time and again that “a union of government and religion tends to destroy government and degrade religion.” The American historian, Clinton Rossiter wrote: “The twin doctrines of separation of church and state and liberty of individual conscience are the marrow of our democracy, if not indeed America’s most magnificent contribution to the freeing of Western man.”

When someone shines a spotlight into a group’s dark side it arouses, almost without fail, righteous indignation along with virulent, “kill-the-messenger” attacks. That is also why it is so utterly frustrating to have any meaningful, rational discussion or collaboration with a shadow-bound individual; you can never quite reach the real person. Instead you are stonewalled; you keep getting programmed, group-speak jargon designed to abort any real scrutiny of the group’s always secretive dark side. Exposing torture and gross violations of the Geneva Convention means we are guilty of “not supporting our troops.”

Mark Twain would have seen right through all this shadow-speak, language intended to “demonize” and kill any serious criticism. Twain once wrote: “Next the statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutation of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception.”

“The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders,” said Hermann Goring, at his trial in Nuremberg. He added: “This is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.” George W. Bush brings up Bin Laden and 9/11 over and over: “The only way our enemies can succeed is if we forget the lessons of September 11.” Constant repetition of certain ideas is a common method of indoctrination used in destructive cults. “It is the absolute right of the state to supervise the formation of public opinion,” declared Josef Goebbles, the Nazi propaganda minister, who knew that tyrannical governments require brainwashed followers. And here’s George W’s not-quite-so-articulate, fundamentalist equivalent: “See, in my line of work, you got to keep repeating things over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda,” quipped our self-titled “War President” in a 24 May 2005 speech.

So the Bush administration “fixes” intelligence reports, “fixes” scientific data on climate change and greenhouse gases, “fixes” reality on the ground in Iraq for the unthinking, uncritical, patriotic, loyal, citizens. These so-called “fixes” are really “lies”–the Bush group’s program to “supervise the formation of public opinion,” as Goebbles stated. Indeed, the purpose of all propaganda is to program individuals to act according to group beliefs and aims. Moreover, presidential scholar, Michael Genovese suggests that 9/11 helped to create a mass illusion: “The public needed to believe that [Bush] had grown,” so “we chose to see him …as bigger, better and different than he was.” You could say that we temporarily projected a “savior” image onto the president; psychologists call this the “halo effect,” the same sort of illusion that can make quite ordinary people suddenly appear to be superhuman, until the truth rattles our projections and reality returns.

Bush precisely articulated his own treacherous dark side when he announced, “The United States of America will not permit the world’s most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world’s most destructive weapons.” An incredible statement considering the current U.S. nuclear weapons program and the decades-long “cold war” between Russia and the United States, the latter having created nuclear weapons technology while the former copies it and both proceed to manufacture and infect the planet with over 60,000 nuclear bombs and warheads–enough destructive power to end all life on the planet many times over. Never mind the fact that the United States actually dropped two atomic bombs on innocent civilian populations in Japan during the Second World War.

Perhaps the most insidious face of the ever-darkening shadow of evangelical, fundamentalist politics and its bright, shining slogan, “compassionate conservatism,” is their in-humane, COMPASSIONLESS disregard for the suffering of others. Of course war is not compassionate for either side. “Compassionate” conservatives care more about the welfare of corporate America than for human suffering. Hypocritical, shadow-laden “compassion” is not new. Hitler and Stalin were two of the most vigorous “pro-lifers” of all time, as were numerous other tyrants. They (Hitler and Stalin) also criminalized previously legal abortions immediately upon taking power. Dwight D. Eisenhower, as a soldier and then as the thirty-fourth President of the United States, knew firsthand the savage, inhumane consequences of warfare. “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.”

Looking closely at the whitewashed rhetoric of fundamentalism, we hear plenty of black magic–oft-repeated mantras like, “family values,” the “right to life,” and a “culture of life.” But what about a trickle of compassion for the estimated 29,000 children under five who die on our planet each day from preventable neglect, starvation, disease, and abuse–a horrific “slaughter of innocents.” What about their “right to life?” In Iraq (at this writing), well over 2,100 American soldiers have been killed and another 15, 000 wounded, many horribly crippled and disfigured for life. Incredibly brave young men and women–yet in reality victims of a fundamentalist/political cult’s deadly shadow. The independent public database, http://www.iraqbodycount.net, reports over 27,000 innocent civilian deaths in Iraq resulting directly from military action by the United States and its allies–definitely not good for our “image.” But this barely-seen slaughter by a “compassionate,” hide-the-coffins Republican cult must be kept in the shadows because, as our President recently explained: “Those people (Iraqi insurgents) kill innocent civilians… women and children.”

Then we have the shadow travesty of religious fundamentalists’ attempts to stop stem cell research. George W. Bush, replying to questions about proposed stem cell legislation, said “…the use of federal money, taxpayers’ money, to promote science which destroys life in order to save life — I’m against that.” Here’s the shadow: No life-saving stem cell research but immense, treasury draining, scientific research into anti-missile systems, nuclear bunker-busting weapons and a whole new arsenal of mini-nuclear weapons–sounds a lot like “using science which destroys life in order to save life!” I hear that lion roaring! Over time, fundamentalist leaders tend to become increasingly paranoid, unpredictable, and treacherously impulsive. This toxic mix of fundamentalism, politics, and explosive shadow dynamics has placed civilization in serious jeopardy at best–a doomsday scenario at worst. Robert J. Lifton, the author of Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism, explains that fundamentalism exists “always on the edge of violence because it ever mobilizes for an absolute confrontation with a designated evil, thereby justifying any actions taken to eliminate that evil.”

So what can you and I do about this group shadow dilemma? Shadow work requires brutally honest self-examination, the courage to admit one’s errors and mistakes, and the moral integrity to change policies, ideas, and opinions that have proven to be fallacious or harmful to others. It’s time for civilized, compassionate, courageous people everywhere to refuse to participate in sanctifying a morally bankrupt administration hiding behind patriotic doublespeak. James Madison warned, “If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.” In his book, Faces of the Enemy, Sam keen explains the “first rule” for understanding our own shadow: “Listen to what the enemy says about you… Borrow the eyes of the alien, see yourself from afar. …Look with suspicion on the rhetoric of your nation.”

As for religious groups, the Dalai Lama has a straightforward strategy: “This is my simple religion,” he says. “There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.” At some point, so-called moderate, non-violent Christians and Moslems must take responsibility for the militant consequences of their beliefs systems. Like the German peoples’ denial of Nazi death camps or the world’s ongoing blindness toward genocide, every peace-loving Christian and every peace-loving Moslem who remains silent, has the blood of innocents on his or her hands, as does each and every politician who has cowardly fallen to their knees before the brutal gods of religious fundamentalism, fanaticism and war.

Unless we change, I see an increasingly dangerous slide into the past, into a sinister dark side that poets describe best: “And we are here as on a darkling plain…Where ignorant armies clash by night.”

By: John Goldhammer

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