Learn and Grow

It is a new year and time for new growth. When I arrived (like the shipwrecked person floating on the C99 sign) on this site, I was hopeful. I thought Bernie was destined to the presidency and our nation was going to move in a better direction. As Bernie was being cheated from the nomination illustrating the impotence of politics, we had the Standing Rock protest which I saw as a powerful statement about many things from environmental justice, indigenous rights, and citizen movements to fossil fuel's dominance, climate chaos, and complete corporate control... including mercenary domestic policing. I continue to study and learn of our situation...social, political, and ecological. Perhaps there are answers and political paths toward peace and prosperity, but I personally don't see a political way forward. I come more and more to the conclusion of my youth - to be a gardener, a naturalist, a musician and enjoy my corner of the world - the biologically rich eastern deciduous forest. So I want to shift the focus of this column to look at stories about people and communities that are living at peace and harmony with the planet while maintaining an eye on the news of the day.

There's been a big brewhaha about "fake news" lately, with "journalistic heavyweights" like the Washington Post running stories suggesting that fake news caused Hillary Clinton to lose the recent election, and the "newspaper of record," the New York Times demanding that Facebook and Google police fake news and prevent its placement in their media. Needless to say, Hillary Clinton's campaign says that Democrats will target fake news and call out Facebook for it, too.

The powers-that-be seem quite desperate to reclaim the narrative and get the work of creating fake news back into the hands of the professionals - the government, that is.

You can bet your bottom dollar that the fake news that these powerful people and institutions want to stop has nothing to do with the propaganda that official sources create with the help of a team of liveried journalists.

I wrote a pair of articles back in 2012 about fake news, calling out Obama for his despicable practices. Sadly, they didn't get much attention, because, well, the audience that I was writing for was incapable of dealing with any criticism of Obama. I'm going to repost them here to illustrate the barrenness of the claims of the power elites calling for censorship. I hope that the crowd here enjoys them.