Carnival of Chaos~ November 2011

Welcome to the Carnival of Chaos! It has been a busy couple of months for me and in the world. Occupy has spread worldwide. The American media, as well as the police, have shown that they are no better than any of the countries we like to demonize. I would like to remember that courageous group of NYPD in Albany that stood down and denied orders arrest the peaceful demonstrators!

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If you are part of the 99% and have a story or comment for the 1% then you can go here! Write to those that are in the 1%, this is my letter....

Greetings,
I have six children 5-16 yrs. and live off of $12-15,000 a year. As you can imagine this is a difficult task. I home school all of them, so my money has to do a lot. Paper, pencils, crayons and books are expensive in my reality. I buy all our clothes at a thrift store or Salvation Army. Just about the ONLY new thing we buy are socks and underwear. The only way we make it is because we receive food stamps. (for that the hoops are many and I see how many deserving families can not do it). It is about $1000 a month to feed all eight of us. I challenge you to feed eight people on that! And make it healthy!
Last week my husbands paycheck bounced. It then began the roll of fees in the banks and with those bills that we paid out on the funds. It will take us weeks to catch up and we will have to do without.
I wonder if you live paycheck to paycheck? What do you struggle with ?
I consider myself blessed to be able to educate my children and to afford a roof over my head(we have been homeless).There are others who have less than us.
I believe deeply that a roof,food, health care and access to equal education are rights not a commodity for the highest bidder. Profit is a well educated and healthy community not a large bank account. If you think we are asking to spread the poverty then yes, in a sense we are. I think you and those in your reality could do with less and the rest of us could do much better with a little more!
What do you believe? What God do you follow?What doctrine do you spread by your actions and life style?
"Once I was in Victoria, and I saw a very large house. They told me it was a bank and that the white men place their money there to be taken care of, and that by and by they got it back with interest. "We are Indians and we have no such bank; but when we have plenty of money or blankets, we give them away to other chiefs and people, and by and by they return them with interest, and our hearts feel good. Our way of giving is our bank."
Chief Maquinna, Nootka

May you be granted wisdom to accompany your knowledge.

I would also ask for all to remember Scott Olsen who was at the Oakland Occupy. A soldier of two tours in Iraq returned unharmed to be brutalized in his own country by those that live off of his tax dollars for exercising his First Amendment rights. Truth is stranger than fiction!

In my personal life, the bees were taken to the fields and the gardens are still being planted. The winter greens are so delicious. Halloween is tonight, I am wring ahead of post. The kids are in their costumes already(9AM!) and I have a birthday,turning 10!, tomorrow. Skate boarding has become a new obsession with the boys, any mode of transport is great with me.

Our submissions this time are quite wonderful. Take the time to visit and leave a comment that tells them where you found their link!

What I do for Eden

tecatti.com presents How to be limitless- Day 1 posted at Tecatti.

Jake Moses presents TeachMe Kindergarten review | Best Kid Ipad Apps posted at Best Kid Ipad Apps, saying, "In-depth review of a spectacular educational app for kids aged 4-6."

If you must spend $ but if you do not have enough to spend on iPad stuff look for open source!

It's Art

Danette M. Schott presents Secret Agent Society for Social Skills posted at Help! S-O-S for Parents.

A fun idea for any kid!

Chaos

Rebecca Turner presents How Your Perception of The World Map is Wrong posted at 1000 Weird Facts.

This is good stuff! For too long we have seen the world from the wrong view! We are the ones 'down under"!

Laura Grace Weldon presents Fun Theory posted at Laura Grace Weldon, saying, "Fun is highly individual. It can’t be easily pre-packaged, even though promoters of textbooks, curricula, and enrichment programs assert their products do just that."

Laura is right but what will you do about it? Someone once said "If you want your child to go to Harvard,send them outside to play". I am usually annoyed by forum moms/teachers that are sure they need the next new edu toy. The trees are my kids toys!

Rose presents No Routine posted at Learning at Home.Some good advice for all of us!

Natural learning can facilitate formal learning.

Jailan Marie presents Idle Thoughts, I Don’t Think So, posted at Innovative Solutions For Positive Change.

JamescReedJr. presents The Razor Blade: Morning Tea posted at The Razor Blade, saying, "Great little article on being a writer. Blog is a philosophical in nature but the writer ties everything together in a way that is easily understood."

Thoughts of a young man.

Aloysiusmenulis presents Can Civil Disobedience ever be moral? posted at aloysiusmenulis.

I believe it is more than moral, it is our duty!

                                                                                                                         Katie Gilbert presents 11 Important Leaders in LGBT Education posted at Best Online Colleges.com, saying, "LGBTQIA individuals and organizations still have a ways to go before they can enjoy full equality in today's society, but that doesn't mean accomplishments and milestones pushing them towards broader acceptance should ever go ignored or unacknowledged."

William Hambleton Bishop, MA presents The Oppression of Creativity and Progression | How regulation, oversight, managed care, and “Big Brother” oppress growth | thoughts from a therapist posted at Thoughts from a Therapist, saying, "this is a post about how regulation hinders creativity... it is a call to do things many ways instead of the"right way.""

Acumen Associates presents Dolch Sight Word Activities – Irregular Verbs posted at sight words game.

And so I say go in peace but when peace is not possible fight for the greater good!

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of carnival of chaos using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

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Occupy Wall Street! Donate !

Don't believe mainstream media that there is no main purpose!    30 million unemployed! 1% holds 95% of the wealth, homelessness, living wage , Simply stated "Stop the wars on the People

http://www.livestream.com/globalrevolution      Donations are needed of all types. There are many ways to help. Go to this page for things needed and ways to help. NO CHECKS only money orders!
I am here because they are helping me!
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDlf-erPtzM]

Occupy somewhere near you!

US Prepares for Another War.........can we say oil?

From the World Socialist Web Site :

Home » World News » Africa » Libya

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Western powers exploit Libyan crisis to step up intervention plans

By Mike Head
5 March 2011

Under the cynical cover of addressing a humanitarian crisis in Libya, the US and its European allies are intensifying military operations and economic measures directed against the regime of Muammar Gaddafi.

 

Amid preparations for a possible armed intervention, US marines have arrived in Greece for deployment to US warships off the Libyan coast, and US military cargo planes have commenced flights to the Tunisian-Libyan border.

 

What began as a popular revolt against the repressive Gaddafi regime is increasingly being channelled, with the help of an interim administration in Benghazi, Libya’s second city, into the pretext for an imperialist intervention. Such an operation would seek to establish a de facto client state in Libya. It would help imperialist forces assert control over the country’s large oil and gas fields and serve as a bastion of reaction against the working-class uprisings sweeping the entire region, from Morocco to Iraq.

 

British and European leaders welcomed President Barack Obama’s statement on Thursday, in which he demanded Gaddafi’s removal and pointedly refused to rule out the imposition of a militarily-enforced “no-fly” zone over Libya. His remarks were an indication of US readiness to support an operation to oust the regime and install a compliant government of the type being shaped in Benghazi.

 

The London-based Guardian reported yesterday that British Prime Minister David Cameron, who had earlier called for Britain and its allies to draw up plans for a no-fly zone, “was offered important support by Barack Obama on Thursday night. American military planners had been instructed to draw up a full range of options, including a no-fly zone, Obama said at the White House during a press conference with his Mexican counterpart, Felipe Calderón.”

 

The British newspaper stated that Cameron and Obama now agreed on “the need for military planning if there is a greater humanitarian catastrophe or if Gaddafi becomes even more aggressive; and the absolute need for Gaddafi to stand down.”

 

According to the Guardian, Cameron and other European leaders had been left in no doubt by Washington that the European Union should be seen to be taking the lead in responding to the Libyan crisis. For that purpose, Cameron had “shown leadership” by openly advocating a no-fly zone, and was now working with French President Nicolas Sarkozy in drawing up plans for an emergency European Union summit in Brussels next Friday.

 

The Russian government, which holds a veto at the UN, has publicly opposed a no-fly zone. But British Foreign Minister William Hague said that while “ideally” such a zone would need to be sanctioned by the UN, that was not essential. No-fly zones operated over Iraq by the US and Britain, as initial steps toward ousting the Saddam Hussein regime, did not receive such Security Council approval.

 

Washington is anxious for its European allies to take the front position, at least publicly, precisely because of the hated record of US imperialism in the Middle East. This includes not only its ongoing wars of occupation in Afghanistan and Iraq, but its role in the post-World War II oppression of Libya itself.

 

In Libya itself, after World War II, the US and Britain took advantage of the defeat of Italy to continue the brutal oppression of the Libyan people, up to half of whom had died under Italian colonial rule from 1911 to 1943. Although a puppet king, Idris I, was installed after formal independence in 1951, Libya’s neo-colonial status continued—symbolised by the establishment of the giant US Wheelus air base near Tripoli, which functioned as a hub for US military operations across North Africa.

 

The discovery of oil in 1959 only tightened the American, British and Italian domination of Libya, the hostility toward which created the conditions for Colonel Gaddafi’s military coup in 1969. One of Gaddafi’s first actions was to demand the closure of the Wheelus base, which—like his nationalisation of Libya's oil industry—initially gave the colonel anti-imperialist credentials and a base of popular support.

 

Yesterday, Britain said it was sending several planes to airlift thousands of Egyptians stuck in refugee camps on the Tunisian-Libyan border, while France said it was dispatching a helicopter carrier to waters off Libya to help evacuate civilians. The British government also reported that one of its border agency vessels had intercepted a ship bound for Libya and seized “a significant quantity of Libyan currency.”

 

Washington is also positioning itself to militarily intervene, in the name of evacuating some of the estimated 180,000 foreign workers who have fled Libya. Two US amphibious warships, the USS Kearsarge and the USS Ponce, joined the USS Barry in the Mediterranean, and 400 marines were flown to a naval base at Souda Bay on the Greek island of Crete, ready to be transferred to the Kearsarge. Base spokesman Paul Farley said they had been deployed “as part of contingency planning to provide the president flexibility on full range of option regarding Libya.”

 

Pentagon spokesman Colonel David Lapan said the military had not been given orders beyond two cargo flights to the Libyan-Tunisian border on Friday and a planned transport of refugees from the Tunisian side of the border today. But he announced that the overall military effort, including movements of ships had been code-named Operation Odyssey Dawn.

 

Unilateral economic sanctions imposed by the Western powers are being used to try to cripple the Gaddafi regime, and seize Libyan assets. US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Thursday that the US had frozen about $32 billion in assets held by the Libyan Investment Authority, Libya’s sovereign wealth fund. Obama described the measures as the “most rapid and forceful set of sanctions that have ever been applied internationally.” On the same day, the British government froze similar assets, including holdings at the HSBC bank, worth about $3.2 billion, on top of about $1.6 billion in assets linked to Gaddafi and his children.

In a related move, Interpol, the international police agency, issued an international “Orange Notice” alert for Gaddafi and 15 members of his inner circle, declaring that they had been “identified as being involved in or complicit in planning attacks, including aerial bombardments, on civilian populations”. While there is little doubt that the Libyan regime has mounted murderous attacks on anti-government protesters, the Western authorities have offered no specific evidence to substantiate such charges, which could provide a justification for sending in forces to capture Gaddafi.

 

Within the US political establishment, pressure is mounting for an intervention. Former Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain and former Democrat vice presidential candidate Senator Joe Lieberman issued a joint statement urging the White House to move faster, “for both moral and strategic reasons.”

 

Speaking at the Brookings Institution in Washington, McCain revealed something of the reactionary calculations motivating US policymakers. He warned that the revolutionary movement seen in Libya, Egypt and elsewhere would continue to spread, “beyond the boundaries of the Arab world” and “throughout the globe.”

 

Inside Libya, Gaddafi’s former justice minister, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, who now heads the opposition National Libyan Council in Benghazi, called for foreign air strikes and a no-fly zone. Citing sources within the council, the New York Times reported that this stance was adopted at a heated council meeting where “others strongly disagreed”. There has been deep opposition to such a call within popular protests against Gaddafi, because of fears of a return to neo-colonial rule—fears that Gaddafi is exploiting to posture as a defender of Libyan sovereignty.

 

The readiness of the bourgeois opposition leaders in Benghazi, however, to facilitate an intervention by the same powers that have plundered Libya historically is rooted in their own class interests in preventing the development of a wider mass movement from below against the regime.

 

Jalil’s call demonstrates that the opposition council, which includes other recent defectors from Gaddafi’s leadership, would be perfectly willing to enter into intimate relations with the Western powers and oil companies—no less than Gaddafi and his cronies, who cemented lucrative ties in Washington, London, Rome and other capitals during the past decade.

 

London’s Daily Telegraph has reported that British officials have held talks with former allies of Gaddafi, to identify “potential future leaders”. Among them was General Obaidi, a former interior minister and head of Libyan special forces. A Downing Street source told the newspaper that Obaidi was someone Britain “could do business with.”

 

The Gaddafi regime is continuing to attack protesters with brutal force. Yesterday, about 1,000 demonstrators shouting slogans and waving pre-1969 flags in the poor suburb of Tajoura on the outskirts of Tripoli were dispersed after Friday prayers by police firing tear gas and plastic bullets. Other parts of the capital were patrolled by fleets of vehicles packed with soldiers, police and men in plain-clothes armed with AK-47s.

 

In Zawiyah, 60 kilometres west of Tripoli, residents told Reuters at least 30 people had been killed, including the town’s opposition commander, when pro-government forces attempted to retake the town. According to residents, pro-Gaddafi militias opened fire on a peaceful protest in front of the town’s hospital, killing seven people and injuring many others.

Despite intensive efforts to prevent media coverage, evidence also emerged of large-scale detentions by the security forces. An Amnesty International spokesman confirmed that it was receiving, and trying to verify, reports of disappearances and rapes in Tripoli.

 

Sporadic fighting occurred elsewhere, especially in areas surrounding key oil facilities. In the east of the country, opposition forces said they had pushed further west and seized control of Ras Lanuf, an oil terminal which has been under the regime’s control and lies along a strategic coastal road between the east and Sirte, Gaddafi’s birthplace.

Terror in Arizona: Just another 'isolated incident'? Funny how that list keeps mounting | Crooks and Liars

Terror in Arizona: Just another 'isolated incident'? Funny how that list keeps mounting | Crooks and Liars.

-- July 2008: A gunman named Jim David Adkisson, agitated at how "liberals" are "destroying America," walks into a Unitarian Church and opens fire, killing two churchgoers and wounding four others.

-- October 2008: Two neo-Nazis are arrested in Tennessee in a plot to murder dozens of African-Americans, culminating in the assassination of President Obama.

-- December 2008: A pair of "Patriot" movement radicals -- the father-son team of Bruce and Joshua Turnidge, who wanted "to attack the political infrastructure" -- threaten a bank in Woodburn, Oregon, with a bomb in the hopes of extorting money that would end their financial difficulties, for which they blamed the government. Instead, the bomb goes off and kills two police officers. The men eventually are convicted and sentenced to death for the crime.

-- December 2008: In Belfast, Maine, police discover the makings of a nuclear "dirty bomb" in the basement of a white supremacist shot dead by his wife. The man, who was independently wealthy, reportedly was agitated about the election of President Obama and was crafting a plan to set off the bomb.

-- January 2009: A white supremacist named Keith Luke embarks on a killing rampage in Brockton, Mass., raping and wounding a black woman and killing her sister, then killing a homeless man before being captured by police as he is en route to a Jewish community center.

-- February 2009: A Marine named Kody Brittingham is arrested and charged with plotting to assassinate President Obama. Brittingham also collected white-supremacist material.

-- April 2009: A white supremacist named Richard Poplawski opens fire on three Pittsburgh police officers who come to his house on a domestic-violence call and kills all three, because he believed President Obama intended to take away the guns of white citizens like himself. Poplawski is currently awaiting trial.

-- April 2009: Another gunman in Okaloosa County, Florida, similarly fearful of Obama's purported gun-grabbing plans, kills two deputies when they come to arrest him in a domestic-violence matter, then is killed himself in a shootout with police.

-- May 2009: A "sovereign citizen" named Scott Roeder walks into a church in Wichita, Kansas, and assassinates abortion provider Dr. George Tiller.

-- June 2009: A Holocaust denier and right-wing tax protester named James Von Brunn opens fire at the Holocaust Museum, killing a security guard.

-- February 2010: An angry tax protester named Joseph Ray Stack flies an airplane into the building housing IRS offices in Austin, Texas. (Media are reluctant to label this one "domestic terrorism" too.)

-- March 2010: Seven militiamen from the Hutaree Militia in Michigan and Ohio are arrested and charged with plotting to assassinate local police officers with the intent of sparking a new civil war.

-- March 2010: An anti-government extremist named John Patrick Bedell walks into the Pentagon and opens fire, wounding two officers before he is himself shot dead.

-- May 2010: A "sovereign citizen" from Georgia is arrested in Tennessee and charged with plotting the violent takeover of a local county courthouse.

-- May 2010: A still-unidentified white man walks into a Jacksonville, Fla., mosque and sets it afire, simultaneously setting off a pipe bomb.

-- May 2010: Two "sovereign citizens" named Jerry and Joe Kane gun down two police officers who pull them over for a traffic violation, and then wound two more officers in a shootout in which both of them are eventually killed.

-- July 2010: An agitated right-winger and convict named Byron Williams loads up on weapons and drives to the Bay Area intent on attacking the offices of the Tides Foundation and the ACLU, but is intercepted by state patrolmen and engages them in a shootout and armed standoff in which two officers and Williams are wounded.

 

Kill your T.V.! And your Video Game System Too!! ( Or Take Back Your Child)

• Lately, my husband and I have been watching TV on the internet. We generally reserve our computer for other tasks and an occasional " treat" of Gilligan's Island for the kids. But  as I like to put it, 'sometimes I don't want to think'.  TV achieves this. We do not have the big black box in our home. Not two ,not one. I don't miss TV and I hate ads. This has unfortunately become part of internet TV as well.



• 

  Is the TV holding you hostage?

  As part of the TV generation of the 70's, I cringe when I see the current selection of "entertainment". The vast array of nothingness is packaged so as to appear as something. I do remember my DAD saying something similar about the shows we watched. Maybe I am getting old..... or maybe he was right! It does seem though that the menu is filled with shows about violence in one form or another. Everybody is fighting . "Cupcake Wars" ,"Hell's Kitchen", "Big Brother', "Bachelorette" whether you want to cook cupcakes, run the kitchen, or meet Mr. Right you need to fight for it. Is this who we are? Is competition so fierce in the cupcake industry? Or did some corporate shill know that if he put a pot of gold in front of us he could conjure up the most duplicitous and obnoxious behavior? Not only was this shill right but there are those of us ready to show this behavior to the world.To say nothing of all the shows about crime, CSI( 3 versions), Criminal Minds, 48 Hours Mystery and more. All find the criminal due to the wonderful police force. Not the same police that beat down protestors or racially profile or help convict the wrong person.


• This is not what I want my children, or myself, watching. We, like it or not, become calloused to such behavior when we see it repeatedly. In the programs this behavior is rewarded, so what's the message to our brain? There are studies that the brain activity is different when watching a documentary.  There are subliminal messages in the shows that can 'help' us become better consumers. And then of course, there are commercials that tell us who we SHOULD be and How to get there. If we buy enough we will be HAPPY!




• What really concerns me is the content of video "games". They are nothing more than virtual murder/rapist training camps! This is not play and to even think that it is would be to convince yourself that the Earth is flat. Why would anyone put this virus in their home let alone the hands of their children?!?! I do not want my family to be numb to violence, oppression,or immorality.


• 
  

  After recent Pentagon research revealed that the desire and intention to enlist is highest among younger recruits (six in ten current US soldiers entered the military as teenagers),1, 2, 3 a level of subtlety, or rather subterfuge has been employed to guide teens toward recruiter offices. As one example of the many available: the US Army sponsors a website labeled “eCybermission.” It offers “web-based science, math, and technology competition” for 11, 12 , and 13 year olds, and the services of on-line uniformed Army personnel “CyberGuides.”4
  
  Since 2002 the Pentagon has developed a massive teen data base gleaned from sources, including records obtained via the “No Child Left Behind Act.” That information is filed in JAMRS, the “Joint Advertising and Marketing Research & Studies” system – a giant Pentagon run, privately subcontracted (Equifax) database containing contact and identification data on over thirty million 16-25 year olds.5

  
  


• Personally, I don't even watch the commercials. It is not something I want in my head. That said, I am one of the 1 in 10 that watched the Wiki-leaks Video of the killing of children in Iraq. This is real. It is reality that has REAL consequences. Why not set you and your family down and watch the real thing?  Because we, as parents, shield our children from the hard facts of life until they can understand them better. So when I read of parents that allow unrestricted TV or video games, I cringe at the human they are producing. Even Disney does not produce a show without the ability to market all aspects of it to your child. They are in your house , they are part of your life.

• CHILDREN


• Approximate number of studies examining TV's effects on children: 4,000
  
  [caption id="" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Who's Raising Your Child?"][/caption]


• Number of minutes per week that parents spend in meaningful


• conversation with their children: 3.5


• Number of minutes per week that the average child watches television: 1,680


• Percentage of day care centers that use TV during a typical day: 70


• Percentage of parents who would like to limit their children's TV watching: 73


• Percentage of 4-6 year-olds who, when asked to choose between watching TV


• and spending time with their fathers, preferred television: 54


• Hours per year the average American youth spends in school: 900 hours


• Hours per year the average American youth watches television: 1500

VIOLENCE

Number of murders seen on TV by the time an average child finishes elementary school: 8,000

Number of violent acts seen on TV by age 18: 200,000

Percentage of Americans who believe TV violence helps precipitate real life mayhem: 79

Millions of Americans are so hooked on television that they fit the criteria for substance abuse as defined in the official psychiatric manual, according to Rutgers University psychologist and TV-Free America board member Robert Kubey. Heavy TV viewers exhibit five dependency symptoms--two more than necessary to arrive at a clinical diagnosis of substance abuse. These include: 1) using TV as a sedative; 2) indiscriminate viewing; 3) feeling loss of control while viewing; 4) feeling angry with oneself for watching too much; 5) inability to stop watching; and 6) feeling miserable when kept from watching.

"We can now say with utmost confidence that regardless of research method -- that is experimental, correlational, or longitudinal -- and regardless of the cultures tested in this study [East and West], you get the same effects," said Anderson, who is also director of Iowa State's Center for the Study of Violence. "And the effects are that exposure to violent video games increases the likelihood of aggressive behavior in both short-term and long-term contexts. Such exposure also increases aggressive thinking and aggressive affect, and decreases prosocial behavior."

I don't think we decided to take our children out of the mainstream public education to hand them over to corporate strangers to educate and raise. But this is what unrestricted viewing is. So are you going to let a shadow raise your children? Plan what they see. Control your eyes, control your reality. To truly think outside the BOX turn the Box OFF! Better yet, throw it out.