I Ching: Hexagram 8 - The Lines, Part 2

Six in the second place means:
Hold to him inwardly.
Perseverance brings good fortune.

If a person responds perseveringly and in the right way to the behests from above that summon him to action, his relations with others are intrinsic and he does not lose himself. But if a man seeks association with others as if he were an obsequious office hunter, he throws himself away. He does not follow the path of the superior man, who never loses his dignity.

Translator of this version of the I Ching is Richard Wilhelm. If you missed any posts in this series, please utilize the I Ching label below.

If You Look Like One...That Is Close Enough

Trey Smith

The US government can order the killing of American citizens even when there is no active intelligence accusing them of carrying out a specific terrorist attack, according to a confidential Justice Department legal memo obtained by NBC News.

The memo, or “white paper,” concludes that assassinations of American citizens are legal if the US government says they are “senior operational leaders” or al-Qaeda or “an associated force.” The Executive Branch can keep this information secret though, and no checks or balances from other branches of government are necessary.

The memo addresses long-standing questions about the Obama administration’s drone war that have been increasingly pronounced ever since a US drone strike in September 2011 killed US citizens and alleged al-Qaeda members Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan, and weeks later Awlaki’s 16-year old son Abdulrahman al-Awlaki.

Without submitting the evidence to a court, without any oversight from Congress, and without even making it’s legal reasoning available to the public, the President can ignore the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution, which says that no person shall “be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”

Standard rules of international law demand that an imminent threat of an immediate attack is required in order to legally initiate the use of force in self-defense. But the Obama administration has greatly expanded the meaning of the word “imminence” to allow for his drone war, taking place mainly in Pakistan and Yemen.

The memo refers to what it calls a “broader concept of imminence” than what has traditionally been required, like actual intelligence an ongoing plot against the US.

“The condition that an operational leader present an ‘imminent’ threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future,” the memo states, contradicting conventional international law.
~ from Leaked Justice Department Memo Reveals Legal Case for Targeted Killings of US Citizens by John Glaser ~

As George Orwell observed, governments have a way of mangling language. They can turn peace into war, choice into limits and freedom into tyranny. In the present case, the Obama administration has turned the word, imminent, -- which means impending or about to occur -- into "it might possibly happen sometime in the next millennium."

What this basically boils down to is highfaluting legalese that says if you look like a "terrorist," that's close enough for us. Since this broad definition isn't open to judicial review or Congressional oversight, it can mean that anyone at anytime can "look" like a terrorist and there's not a damn thing anybody can do about it!

If the United States was an authoritarian dictatorship, such a revelation would be met with a yawn because dictators write their own rules. The problem, of course, is that the US ostensibly is not supposed to be one of these. We supposedly have checks-and-balances plus we are guided by the rule of law.

Afternoon Matinee: Protest - Uprising

Performed by Muse

Paranoia is in bloom

The P.R. transmissions will resume

They'll try to push drugs that keep us all dumbed down

And hope that we will never see the truth around (so come on)

Another promise, another seed

Another packaged lie to keep us trapped in greed

And all the green belts wrapped around our minds

And endless red tape to keep the truth confined (so come on)

They will not force us

They will stop degrading us

They will not control us

We will be victorious (so come on)

Interchanging mind control

Come let the revolution take its toll

If you could flick a switch and open your third eye

You'd see that we should never be afraid to die (so come on)

Rise up and take the power back

It's time the fat cats had a heart attack

You know that their time's coming to an end

We have to unify and watch our flag ascend (so come on)

They will not force us

They will stop degrading us

They will not control us

We will be victorious (so come on)

Hey, hey, hey, hey

Hey, hey, hey, hey

Hey, hey, hey, hey

They will not force us

They will stop degrading us

They will not control us

We will be victorious (so come on)

Hey, hey, hey, hey

~ from Lyric Wiki ~

As Long As It Is Not Us

Trey Smith

Polite Fascism has come to America. If this concept sounds preposterous to Americans it may sound otherwise to foreigners who are getting the worst of it. The public judges the White House largely by its conduct of domestic affairs, about what it has done for them, and not by its foreign wars, which is where America’s fascist brutality is largely exercised and of which the U.S. public knows little. Obama has quieted many Leftist critics by taking actions to appease their needs, such as securing passage of Obamacare. He has satisfied gays, by pledging to treat them as human beings. He has indicated he will not let the Republicans eviscerate Social Security, reassuring the elderly. And he is calling for enactment of gun control legislation, long sought by the Left.

What’s more, neither the Pentagon nor the FBI is rounding up large numbers of domestic dissidents and putting them in “detention camps,” as Nixon’s Attorney General Richard Kleindienst once threatened would be the fate of anti-war demonstrators who tied up traffic in Washington, D.C. Obama’s Department of Homeland Security may be a sword hung over the heads of the citizenry but its officers are not smashing store windows and beating Jews on the Hitler model. Suffice it to say the FBI now and then entraps Muslims in dangerous bomb plot “conspiracies,” which are alleged plots, not actions. But it has made no wholesale arrests. The object of Polite Fascism apparently is to keep people in line by making examples of the few rather than mincemeat of the many.
~ from Polite Fascism at Home, the Real Stuff Abroad by Sherwood Ross ~

As I think you all should know by now, I am NOT a fan of the current President of these United States. While I was pleased that voters were able to move beyond their usual bigotry to elect a person of color, I would have been far happier if it had been somebody else!

From time to time, when I voice my displeasure with Obama, someone will point to this or that issue and say I should give the man his due. I will admit that Obama has done a few half-ass progressive things -- though he tends to water them down -- but I still think his legacy to this point is rather puny.

However, for the sake of argument, let's say that Obama spends his second term fighting for all the various domestic policies and initiatives I favor. Let's say he finally addresses climate change, gun violence, employment, poverty and health care (to name a few) in a serious and substantive manner. Would that be enough not only to shut me up but cause me to jump on the bandwagon?

NO! Not even close.

As long as he maintains a secret government apparatus that thumbs its nose at Congress, the American people and the US Constitution, I will not shut up. As long as he continues to brutalize a good chunk of the globe economically AND militarily, he will be no friend of mine. Yes, I would very much appreciate it if he would work domestically for the vast majority here in the US, but I want the very same thing for my sisters and brothers overseas.

I'm not like the mafia boss's wife. I don't say, "As long as he treats me well, I don't care how many people he kills."

As Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., once said, "A threat to justice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."

A government that kills "others" with impunity will eventually kill its own citizens in the same way. I don't expect this to occur routinely in my lifetime, but it's coming.

Bit by Bit - Chapter 8, Part 2

Trey Smith

He who is overnice in hearing will be confused by the five notes, bewitched by the six tones, by the sounds of metal and stone, strings and woodwinds, the huang-chung and ta-lu pitch pipes - am I wrong? So we have Music Master K'uang. He who is fork-fingered with benevolence will tear out the Virtue given him and stifle his inborn nature in order to seize fame and reputation, leading the world on with pipe and drum in the service of an unattainable ideal - am I wrong? So we have Tseng and Shih. He who is web-toed in argumentation will pile up bricks, knot the plumb line, apply the curve, letting his mind wander in the realm of "hard" and "white," "likeness" and "difference," huffing and puffing away, lauding his useless words - am I wrong? So we have Yang and Mo.' All these men walk a way that is overnice, web-toed, wide of the mark, fork-fingered, not that which is the True Rightness of the world.
~ Burton Watson translation ~

What does it mean to be too nice? For me, it means a forced expression -- something that's not genuine. A lot of people feign niceness simply because they don't want to face conflicts and challenges head on. But conflicts and challenges are a part of life. Trying to avoid them at all costs doesn't work. They will befall you, nonetheless.

To view the Index page for this series, go here.

Winning Is Not Part of the Real Equation

Trey Smith

America's "War on Terror" is a battle that can never be won. There is no finite or stationary target. There is no quantifiable enemy to defeat. This contrived "war" is far different than a typical war. In a typical war, there is a defined enemy and objective. Once those are vanquished, the war ends. But when your enemy is little more than shadows, you never can be certain all the "shadows" have been defeated.

And so you fight on.

In the process of fighting on, you work hard to divert the attention of your citizenry from other important issues. You whip up a constant litany of bogeymen for them to fear. You tell them that, in order to protect them, you will need to curtail many of THEIR liberties. Few of them protest because...well...you've already scared them to death. The majority of them willingly accept these curtailments.

If you are one of the ones who reaps tremendous financial and power benefits from this "war," why would you ever want to claim victory? Announcing that we had won the "War on Terror" would mean a diminishing of your returns. You would need to restore those liberties you had taken away. You wouldn't be able to divert as much money from the public treasury as before. Even worse, you'd have to focus the public's attention on tangible issues like job creation or climate change and you'd have to offer genuine solutions.

The "War on Terror" is a charade. Winning is not part of the real equation. Ripping off the majority -- in more ways than one -- is.

I Ching: Hexagram 8 - The Lines, Part 1

Six at the beginning means:
Hold to him in truth and loyalty;
This is without blame.
Truth, like a full earthen bowl
Thus in the end
Good fortune comes from without.

Fundamental sincerity is the only proper basis for forming relationships. This attitude, symbolized by a full earthen bowl, in which the content is everything and the empty form nothing, shows itself not in clever words but through the strength of what lies within the speaker. This strength is so great that it has power to attract good fortune to itself from without.

Translator of this version of the I Ching is Richard Wilhelm. If you missed any posts in this series, please utilize the I Ching label below.

All Are Well

Scott Bradley

If you have read just a few of these posts you have probably encountered my familiar refrain that "All is well" at least once. This is organically linked to my other constant refrain that "There are no conditions to meet." The first speaks to everything. The second tends to speak to the individual. If all is indeed well, then no individual thing is not likewise essentially well. These are, I believe, central pillars of Zhuangzi's philosophy, but if I am mistaken, no matter, they are central to mine. What I would like to do in this post is to flip them both over and look at them from the corresponding viewpoints of "all" or "each".

If all is well, then all are well. If there are no conditions for me to meet, then there are no conditions for you or anything else to meet. Clearly, we cannot have the one without the other. Self-affirmation necessarily implies universal affirmation. Indeed, though I cannot honestly wrap my mind around it enough to say so definitively, it is probably the case that there can be no self-affirmation without universal affirmation or universal affirmation without self-affirmation. (If I don't affirm 'me', I can't affirm you; if I don't affirm you, I can't affirm 'me'.)

What does seem clear is that a great deal of our criticism of others is largely a projection of our own issues. (It does not matter that they are 'true' of the other; it is what is true of me that matters.) Criticism is, in any event, a reflection of one's allowing what one does not like or approve of to "bug" one. To put it in Zhuangzian terms, it is to allow disharmony to enter one's Numinous Reservoir. But though this inner harmony is unaffected by the apparent outer disharmony, it would be mistaken, I believe, to think that the inner is altogether insulated from the outer; the inner harmony is realized and preserved not by erecting an impenetrable barrier, but, quite the opposite, by dissolving the barrier altogether. One's own harmony (which harmonizes one's own disharmony) harmonizes all disharmony. Disharmony does not enter because it has been harmonized in affirmation.

I recently quoted part of Guo Xiang's (252-312) introductory response to Zhuangzi; here it is more fully: “Though some are larger and some smaller, every being without exception is released into the range of its own spontaneous attainments, so that each being relies on its own innate character, each deed exactly matching its own capabilities. Since each fits perfectly into precisely the position it occupies, all are equally far-reaching and unfettered. How could any one be superior to any other?” (Ziporyn) This, I believe, perfectly captures the spirit of Zhuangzi’s suggestion that we “follow along with the ‘rightness’ of the present ‘this’.” “This” is all we encounter. Its “rightness” is that it is. Every deviation (and there are deviations, at least in the human sphere) takes place within this context and is thus harmonized, not by rejection, but by affirmation. This dynamic is logically inexpressible, as are most all things pertaining to life.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

I Ching: Hexagram 8 - The Image

On the earth is water:
The image of HOLDING TOGETHER.
Thus the kings of antiquity
Bestowed the different states as fiefs
And cultivated friendly relations
With the feudal lords.

Water fills up all the empty places on the earth and clings fast to it. The social organization of ancient China was based on this principle of the holding together of dependents and rulers. Water flows to unite with water, because all parts of it are subject to the same laws. So too should human society hold together through a community of interests that allows each individual to feel himself a member of a whole. The central power of a social organization must see to it that every member finds that his true interest lies in holding together with it, as was the case in the paternal relationship between king and vassals in ancient China.

Translator of this version of the I Ching is Richard Wilhelm. If you missed any posts in this series, please utilize the I Ching label below.

The Person to Marry

Trey Smith

"Hiring" pols via the ballot who hate government pretty much guarantees poor governance: even corrupt governance. One of the biggest national cons involves the concept that "hiring" pols via the ballot who claim to hate government will make things better. If someone claims government is always the problem, why would you expect them to make it better? As an employer, would you hire someone after an interview where they insist your business is always up to no good and will always fail?

No, they're be more likely to steal from you, sell things out your back door to their friends, and recommend you hire anyone willing to take an ax to what they've already admitted they have no respect for.

That kind of attitude infects all of society. Con jobs multiply like rabbits on Viagra.
~ from Inspection - Of Tiresome Con Jobs by Ken Carman ~

Another way to look at this issue concerns the person you marry. Who would want to marry a person who declared that the institution of marriage was a flawed concept? Before you walked down the aisle, your mate would tell you that marriage creates more problems than it's worth and he/she will do everything in their power to end the institution of marriage as we know it.

Who would think that such declarations portend a happy betrothal? Who would think that such a spouse would be trustworthy and faithful?

The "anti-government" government leaders have shown time and again that they ONLY favor government when it lines the pockets of the fat cats. When it comes to protecting the interests of the oligarchy, government is a very GOOD thing. When it comes to safeguarding the interests of the rest of us, government is a very BAD thing. And yet, people keep voting for them!

Afternoon Matinee: Protest - Solidarity Forever

Performed by Lily Eskelsen

(Below are the unabridged lyrics of the song.)

When the union's inspiration through the workers' blood shall run,

There can be no power greater anywhere beneath the sun;

Yet what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one,

But the union makes us strong.

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

For the union makes us strong.

Is there aught we hold in common with the greedy parasite,

Who would lash us into serfdom and would crush us with his might?

Is there anything left to us but to organize and fight?

For the union makes us strong.

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

For the union makes us strong.

It is we who plowed the prairies; built the cities where they trade;

Dug the mines and built the workshops, endless miles of railroad laid;

Now we stand outcast and starving midst the wonders we have made;

But the union makes us strong.

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

For the union makes us strong.

All the world that's owned by idle drones is ours and ours alone.

We have laid the wide foundations; built it skyward stone by stone.

It is ours, not to slave in, but to master and to own.

While the union makes us strong.

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

For the union makes us strong.

They have taken untold millions that they never toiled to earn,

But without our brain and muscle not a single wheel can turn.

We can break their haughty power, gain our freedom when we learn

That the union makes us strong.

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

For the union makes us strong.

In our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold,

Greater than the might of armies, magnified a thousand-fold.

We can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old

For the union makes us strong.

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

Solidarity forever,

For the union makes us strong.

~ from Lyric Wiki ~

The Surprise Party

Trey Smith

We have a problem in this nation with the two so-called major political parties. Every four years they craft elaborate platforms that their elected candidates tend to ignore or outright thumb their noses at. Their political candidates spend an inordinate amount of time on the campaign trail making all sorts of promises and pledges, yet, if elected, they immediately suffer from acute amnesia or try to convince the public that they never made any pledges or promises to begin with -- this is true even when those words were videotaped or recorded.

I think it's about time that we founded a new political party, one that can outplay the Republicrats at their own game. So, let me be the first to introduce you to (drum roll, please) the Surprise Party (?P).

Personally, I think the ?P will attract a lot of candidates. The ?P has no political platform, no political principles and their candidates are forbidden to make any promises or pledges. To sign on, a candidate can be conservative, middle of the road or a flaming liberal. Gender doesn't matter nor does race or ethnicity. Religious preference or lack thereof doesn't matter either. When it comes to the crucial issues of the day, you can fall on either side of the divide. You can be well respected by your peers or considered an absolute crackpot.

Out on the campaign trail, all you have to do is smile, shake a lot of hands and kiss a slew of babies. When reporters, pundits or average citizens ask you questions as to how you plan to govern, all you have to say is "Elect me and then you'll see." If pressed further, all you need to do is offer a devilish smirk, a shrug of your shoulders and you can fire back, "I don't want to spoil the surprise."

Once elected, you'll be like almost every other elected official. Every speech you make or vote you cast will be a bona fide surprise. However, unlike the Republicrats, you can brag that you didn't go back on a campaign promise or pledge. How could you? You're a proud member of the Surprise Party!

Bit by Bit - Chapter 8, Part 1

Trey Smith

Two toes webbed together, a sixth finger forking off - these come from the inborn nature but are excretions as far as Virtue is concerned. Swelling tumors and protruding wens - these come from the body but are excretions as far as the inborn nature is concerned. Men overnice in the ways of benevolence and righteousness try to put these into practice, even to line them up with the five vital organs!

This is not the right approach to the Way and its Virtue. Therefore he who has two toes webbed together has grown a flap of useless flesh; he who has a sixth finger forking out of his hand has sprouted a useless digit; and he who imposes overnice ways, webs and forked fingers, upon the original form of the five vital organs will become deluded and perverse in the practice of benevolence and righteousness and overnice in the use of his hearing and sight. Thus he who is web-toed in eyesight will be confused by the five colors, bewitched by patterns and designs, by the dazzling hues of blue and yellow, of embroidery and brocade - am I wrong? So we have Li Chu.
~ Burton Watson translation ~

What is normal? Each of us possesses imperfections. We talk about averages, but I've really never met an "average" person.

We each have limitations. In one way or another, every one of us is dazzled and bewitched by the sensations and experiences our lives have to offer.

To view the Index page for this series, go here.

Yep, That's Called a "Death Squad"

Trey Smith

The film Secret Wars, which premiered at Sundance, can be viewed, as Amy Goodman sees it, as an important narrative of excesses in the global "war on terror". It is also a record of something scary for those of us at home – and uncovers the biggest story, I would say, in our nation's contemporary history.

Though they wisely refrain from drawing inferences, Scahill and Rowley have uncovered the facts of a new unaccountable power in America and the world that has the potential to shape domestic and international events in an unprecedented way. The film tracks the Joint Special Operations Command (JSoc), a network of highly-trained, completely unaccountable US assassins, armed with ever-expanding "kill lists". It was JSoc that ran the operation behind the Navy Seal team six that killed bin Laden.

Scahill and Rowley track this new model of US warfare that strikes at civilians and insurgents alike – in 70 countries. They interview former JSoc assassins, who are shell-shocked at how the "kill lists" they are given keep expanding, even as they eliminate more and more people.

Our conventional forces are subject to international laws of war: they are accountable for crimes in courts martial; and they run according to a clear chain of command. As much as the US military may fall short of these standards at times, it is a model of lawfulness compared with JSoc, which has far greater scope to undertake the commission of extra-legal operations – and unimaginable crimes.

JSoc morphs the secretive, unaccountable mercenary model of private military contracting, which Scahill identified in Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, into a hybrid with the firepower and intelligence backup of our full state resources.
~ from JSoc: Obama's Secret Assassins by Naomi Wolf ~

Strip away any mention of President Obama and the US Government and then replace it with your favorite communist or authoritarian dictatorship and most Americans would immediately identify JSoc as a Death Squad. If I shared the above information and identified the nation as one from South America in the 70s and 80s, "Death Squad" would roll off of people's lips.

For all the screaming from the Right about Obama being this socialist flaming liberal, the truth of the matter is that he is about as LEFT as the Tea Party! I don't care if he mouths populist platitudes about gay rights or job creation. You simply can't be seen as a beacon for progressive politics if you run a secret Death Squad from the White House!!!

What makes this whole situation even more damning is that Obama is a constitutional scholar. The man used to teach constitutional law. And yet, here he is undermining the constitution in about the most vulgar way possible. I continue to be absolutely bewildered how so-called progressives can support this guy. If his name was Bush or Romney, progressives would be literally bouncing off the walls.

I Ching: Hexagram 8 - The Judgment

HOLDING TOGETHER brings good fortune.
Inquire of the oracle once again
Whether you possess sublimity, constancy, and perseverance;
Then there is no blame.
Those who are uncertain gradually join.
Whoever comes too late
Meets with misfortune.

What is required is that we unite with others, in order that all may complement and aid one another through holding together. But such holding together calls for a central figure around whom other persons may unite. To become a center of influence holding people together is a grave matter and fraught with great responsibility. It requires greatness of spirit, consistency, and strength. Therefore let him who wishes to gather others about him ask himself whether he is equal to the undertaking, for anyone attempting the task without a real calling for it only makes confusion worse than if no union at all had taken place.

But when there is a real rallying point, those who at first are hesitant or uncertain gradually come in of their own accord. Late–comers must suffer the consequences, for in holding together the question of the right time is also important. Relationships are formed and firmly established according to definite inner laws. Common experiences strengthen these ties, and he who comes too late to share in these basic experiences must suffer for it if, as a straggler, he finds the door locked.

If a man has recognized the necessity for union and does not feel strong enough to function as the center, it is his duty to become a member of some other organic fellowship.

Translator of this version of the I Ching is Richard Wilhelm. If you missed any posts in this series, please utilize the I Ching label below.

"The Earth Doesn't Move"

Scott Bradley

David Abram (The Spell of the Sensuous), in building his case for a re-integration of the human with the natural world in which we live, lays his philosophical foundation on the approach of phenomenology. I have long thought that I am some kind of phenomenologist, though I have never truly been able to grasp what phenomenology is. (And if I have somehow fooled you into thinking I have any great grasp of things philosophical, let me assure you I do not.) Abram might have helped me to make a little progress in that regard, though my summation here may still be wide of the mark. (Though in important ways, that should not matter; misunderstandings are at least original.)

As in so much modern philosophical discussion, Descartes is taken as a good place to start. Descartes represents the extreme mind-body dualism upon which 'pure' science rests. The mind is believed able to objectively understand the physical world because it is itself other than that world. This leads to all manner of philosophical problems which Husserl, the 'founder' of phenomenology, sought to remedy. Phenomenology seeks to bridge the gap between mind and the physical world by prioritizing and studying our experience of it. This may not sound all that revolutionary, but its ramifications are profoundly so. And the reason I discuss it here is because I believe it echoes the more 'spiritually' revolutionary character of philosophical Daoism.

In later unpublished notes Husserl, who was himself evolving into the significance of his own philosophy, proclaims that "the earth doesn't move". If we can understand how this is 'true', we will begin to understand how radical this approach to our human reality actually is. Though our objectifying, truth-knowing mind protests that "yes, it does", our actual consensual life-experience-reality is rooted in and proceeds from the perception that it does not. This is not a denial of objective truth, but an acknowledgement that our human experience is rooted in an organic emersion in the world which objective truth fails to penetrate. Our so-called objective truth, moreover, is grounded in our pre-cognitive experience of the world. Concepts like space, time, rest and movement all have their beginning here and thus our 'objectivity' begins and ends in deep subjectivity.

It should be obvious how Zhuangzi's protest that allowing the "understanding mind" to have priority over our more visceral, pre-cognitive experience cuts us off from an enormous amount of our humanity, leaving us hanging naked in the wind, anticipates Husserl's realization. Zhuangzi's appeal, like Husserl's, moreover, is never to anything other than our experience. The Whole to which we re-connect as an organic participant is represented in Nature as experienced, not in ethereal 'divine' realities. Zhuangzi's 'mysticism' is not extrinsic, but intrinsic; we rediscover our human experience as integral with the ever-transforming expression of Nature.

You can check out Scott's writings on Zhuangzi here.

I Ching: Hexagram 8 (Pi)

above K'AN THE ABYSMAL, WATER
below K'UN THE RECEPTIVE, EARTH

The waters on the surface of the earth flow together wherever they can, as for example in the ocean, where all the rivers come together. Symbolically this connotes holding together and the laws that regulate it. The same idea is suggested by the fact that all the lines of the hexagram except the fifth, the place of the ruler, are yielding. The yielding lines hold together because they are influenced by a man of strong will in the leading position, a man who is their center of union. Moreover, this strong and guiding personality in turn holds together with the others, finding in them the complement of his own nature.

Translator of this version of the I Ching is Richard Wilhelm. If you missed any posts in this series, please utilize the I Ching label below.

What Did God Do Before the Advent of the Internet?

Trey Smith

Lately, I have been seeing a lot of ads on TV for a particular internet dating site: ChristianMingle.com. Hey, it's fine with me if certain Christians only wish to date other Christians. It's their choice, not mine. What I find interesting is the slogan for this website: Find God's Match for You.

I would think that an all-powerful, all-knowing being could get this kind of message to an individual without resorting to the internet. Couldn't God simply write it in a person's heart or leave little notes around the house? Couldn't he simply whisper the name in someone's ear and provide all the necessary contact information?

But the more important question is: What did God do before the advent of the internet? What methods did he utilize to share this kind of important information? If he wasn't able to communicate dating preferences to people, then he should be damn glad a bunch of innovative human thinkers developed this medium for him. If he was able to communicate dating preferences to folks prior to the world wide web, why can't he utilize those same avenues now?

Afternoon Matinee: Protest - I Ain't Marching Anymore

Performed by Phil Ochs

Oh, I marched to the battle of New Orleans,

At the end of the early British wars.

The young land started growing,

The young blood started flowing.

But I ain't a-marching anymore!

Oh I killed my share of Injuns in a thousand different fights,

I was there at the Little Big Horn.

I heard many men a-lying,

I saw many more a-dying.

But I ain't a-marching anymore!

It's always the old to lead us to the wars,

Always the young to fall.

Now look at what we've won with a saber and a gun.

Tell me is it worth it all?

For I stole California from the Mexican land,

Fought in the bloody Civil War.

Yes, I even killed my brothers,

And so many others.

But I ain't a-marching anymore!

For I marched to the battle of the German trench,

In a war that was bound to end all wars.

Oh I must have killed a million men,

And now they want me back again.

But I ain't a-marching anymore!

It's always the old to lead us to the wars,

Always the young to fall.

Now look at what we've won with a saber and a gun.

Tell me is it worth it all?

For I flew the final mission in the Japanese sky,

Set off the mighty mushroom roar.

But I saw the cities burnin',

And I knew that I was learnin',

That I ain't a-marching anymore!

Now the labor leader's screamin' when they closed the missile plant,

United Fruit screams at the Cuban shore.

Call it peace or call it treason,

Call it love or call it reason.

But I ain't a-marching anymore!

I ain't a-marching anymore!

~ from Lyric Wiki ~

A Bit of a Jamboree

Trey Smith

I hope many of you have been enjoying the focus on protest music in the Afternoon Matinee series (and yes, I do know that title is redundant). I began this endeavor on December 17 and I'm still going strong. I continue to enjoy doing the research and there are scads more songs I haven't discovered yet.

I have been working hard to offer readers a wide diversity of music genres. I grew up in the folk protest period in the 1960s and, originally, I planned only to feature protest songs from that era. However, after I began work on this project, I discovered that protest music didn't die off like I thought. A lot of singers and bands have continued the tradition up to the current time.

I am sure that the main reason that I thought protest songs predominantly had died out is that there aren't a lot of popular folk singers around these days. It seems that many punk bands have taken up the cause and, truth be known, I don't generally listen to punk music. As I delved into that genre, I began to discover that hip hop and rap artists have contributed a lot of protest music too. I've featured a bit of reggae and other genres that I am less familiar with.

Just as the spoken and written can inspire people, music can too. And that's what this little project is all about: Inspiring you to make a difference in your own way.