7/20/11

Life is about learning to live beyond violence

On Culture Poetic Meditation - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"The violent foundation was the truth.
Dismantle it and you will move beyond.
Let it persist and Abba's hands are tied.
For Abba wills you free to make the choice."

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Even the Abrahamic faiths fail in the realm of values

If Abraham's Religions Could All See - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com: "Abba's Way is a universal path. Not a religion, not a creed. It is a way of tolerance, helpfulness and the practice of democracy. Its foundation is nonidolatry. Why did the prophets arise if not to challenge the god-on-our side mentality of the authors of the Pentateuch and other seminal texts of the Abrahamic faiths?"

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Values are everything and we hardly know it

Four Active Values - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com I have made it a mission for several decades to share my observations from working with teenagers and teaching them to sing the Gospel of Mark, which I made into simple songs that followed the text. I inferred that the best expression of the values that emerged was tolerance, helpfulness, democracy and non-idolatry. These are so at variance with what we have inherited - a mishmash of philosophical suppositions which do not even understand that we live by willed values - that I take pains to offer what help I can in driving this theory home.


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JSTOR:and the Federal Government earn a failing grade

JSTOR: Taxon, Vol. 29, No. 1 (Feb., 1980), pp. 1-13: "You are viewing the first page/citation. Full-text access may be available if you are affiliated with a participating library or publisher. Check access options or login if you have an account." I will never have an account with you. You are part of the problem not the answer. The arrest of Aaron Swartz for standing up against you is a terrible blot on the DOJ and something you should work to get undone. And I don't just mean dropping charges because the downloaded material was returned. You are to be commended for doing that. Now you should make your site free to people who are seeking knowledge and who are not part of the organizations that pay you.  I searched for Aaron's name on your site and got this page. It was perfect. An example of what seekers after knowledge get to stop them cold. You are said to be not for profit. I do not believe it. Profit is hidden in NFPs. The motives are financial. The result is antidemocratic exclusion in keeping with a value system that no longer has any authority in the world.




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Funny in a way that O'Reilly and Krauthammer don't have any more idea than anyone else about the GOP race (Video)

Is Sarah Palin Preparing for a Presidential Run? - Interviews - The O'Reilly Factor - FoxNews.com I watched this whole video with the idea I would pick up something I did not already know. No success. The only real error I heard was K saying that Petty's Texas record has been good. That will not pass muster if he gets into the race. In that sense all three of the alleged front-runners have near fatal flaws. If Palin comes in that would make four. In order of name they are: No one likes him. Marcus, etc. Secession and W. And Quitter. And the only thing they seem to have waiting in the wings is Rotund Wise Guy. That makes five stooges in my book. I would say Somalia and the GOP have one thing in common - famine.


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Commercial Sort Of

Abba's Way - iUniverse A few years ago I self-published a book in verse that I called Abba's Way. I have since developed its thoughts. It rose from a confluence of Nietzsche's Zarathustra and my own parsing of the gospel of Jesus based on the text (mainly) of Mark in the Synoptics. It is available in three formats, the least expensive being the ebook.

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Right for Boston dudes paying and maiming is all in a good night's work

From the No Shit, Sherlock Dept. « I Blame The Patriarchy: "Men who pay for sex are more likely than non-buyers to commit a variety of offenses, including violent crimes against women, according to research conducted in the Boston area." I am for legalizing most everything but I am also for shaming people into finding the resources within themselves to behave decently. IBP is right pile on to dudes. Dudes should support the effort.

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I hate, I despise sites that charge for scholarship

Yglesias | ThinkProgress: "A publisher doesn’t want to give up his fees, which are valuable in meeting the costs of producing scholarship. But on net, it’s a mix of pointless and pernicious. Sale of access to journals helps finance scholarship, but it also raises the cost of scholarship. If everything was distributed for free, the whole exact same enterprise could be undertaken with no net financial loss. But there would be huge potential gains. A precocious 17 year-old could have free access to scholarship. So could a researcher living and working in a poor country." And Matthew seems to agree. That's progress in my book. Bye Jstor.

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This guy and I used to record together (Video)


Bill Horwitz. I wanted to play "Lies Lies Lies" but it was not there.

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Is it axiomatic that big oil routinely lies?

Exxon now acknowledges ruptured pipeline in Yellowstone River transports tar sands | The Washington Independent: "Though Exxon Mobil initially insisted that the pipeline that ruptured and spilled into Montana’s Yellowstone River this month carried only low sulfur crude from Wyoming, the company has now acknowledged that the pipeline is used to transport tar sands crude from Alberta." Insisted? Maybe that is more than a lie. Perhaps a reflex? A habit? A sort of droit de signeur with the US as the lady?


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Britain is not like us - they can change governments just like that.

Scotland Yard Is Falling Down: Will It Take Cameron Too? - TIME: "The revelations threaten to tarnish the world's premier policing brand and could yet bring down Britain's Prime Minister, or at least give him a bit of a Wendi Deng-ing."

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This is the kind of take down that makes the most sense (Text and Video)

Al Franken Pokes Fun At Focus On The Family Mischaracterizing Study At DOMA Hearing (VIDEO) | TPMMuckraker Al is not poking fun. He is exposing a distortion of the sort that litters the political landscape.

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I was gonna post a Jon Stewart video but then I thought

You know what? FOX is going to self destruct. The Wingnuts are going to self-destruct. Let's move on to something else. So I didn't. 
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So if this is so proper what is proper about spilling it all over Radar

Doug Hutchison & 16-Year-Old Bride: 'Nothing Inappropriate About It Whatsoever' | Radar Online This is the most lugubrious thing I have heard all day. Egoism a deux. I will have no trouble forgetting this.

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Some you never get tired of hearing from time to time


And doubtless some have never heard at all ...

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Child deaths absolutely need more and better investigation - not just the shaken kind

Q & A: A Prominent Advocate Presses for Better Investigations of Child Deaths - ProPublica: "Recently, we interviewed Dr. Carole Jenny, a pediatrician at Hasbro Children's Hospital and a leading figure at the National Center on Shaken Baby Syndrome. She is a high-profile advocate for putting more resources toward investigating suspect child deaths."

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There is more than one way to attack education but this is one of the worst

Global: Schools No Havens in War Zones | Human Rights Watch: "Governments should improve protections for students and teachers during wartime by explicitly outlawing attacks on schools and curtailing their use by the military, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today." The Tea Party qualifies as an attacker. So in sme respects does the school system itself. The solution lies in the restructuring of society into car-free, walkable, face to face communities. And yes outlawing anything that is lethal including war. It's time.

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The cost of organic food would not be a problem if we all got back to it and zapped highway culture as the norm

Organic Foods Have Broad Appeal, But Costs Temper Demand : Shots - Health Blog : NPR Step One: Build no more superhighwars 2. Build no more sprawl. 3. Transform existing residential areas into car free zones and rezone them for integral living 4. Mass produce dwelling components and make them lego-like 5. Create skeletal matrixes to enable connection of modular units 6. redensify to create local economic systems of 5-10K 7. When you get this far organic food will be a short walk away.

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Little bit of a reunion wish there were more (Video)




Roger, David, Bob


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Europe is about one good cough away from complete disarray not good

Europe at the Brink of Debt Crisis - NYTimes.com: "The first, and perhaps immediate, consequence of a failed summit meeting could be a disorderly and destructive Greek default. The shock waves could spread to Ireland and Portugal as lenders conclude that if Greece can default despite European Union bailout programs, so could those countries." Let's just say that everything that is happening can be subsumed under the heading of big oil, consumer society, environmental desecration and a value system that Jesus tried to rectify long ago - one that could save us all. It is called Abba's way and it consists of non-idolatry, helpfulness, tolerance and democracy. All of these can be willed by individuals. That is what makes them values.

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I'll tell you when and where where hair made a difference.

When a French journalist was killed the night Meredith came to Ole Miss. When Mickey Schwerner joined two others and met death in Mississippi. Both men had beards. It was a tell too obvious and hardly intelligent. I have always thought so and said so.
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I am getting mightily tired of these fashion sidebar stories

Rebekah Brooks’s Hair Distracts at Murdoch Phone-Hacking Scandal Hearing - The Daily Beast: "There’s a time when a wild mane of wavy auburn hair sends just the right message of breezy nonconformity and proud individuality, but when you’re trying to convince the world that you’re an aboveboard, by-the-rules, straitlaced sort of manager—who’s done nothing illegal—boho hair plays to your disadvantage." If this is news, excuse me.


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When a 102 year old mom can rail and rant she wins laurels from me

Rupert Murdoch Scandal: His Mother Warned of Invasion of Privacy Risks - The Daily Beast: "Family matriarch Dame Elisabeth Murdoch said his News of the World purchase nearly “killed me,” and told her son of her concerns about invasion of privacy. By David Leser." My mom is 102 just like Rupert's but such wisdom as she continues to possess is not expressed any more. Only her eyes tell tales. Rupert has one asset worth all of his zillions. Enough said.


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Just in case you've missed Arvo Part all your life (Video)


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Oh right I forgot it was a gang of five

Tom Coburn, Dr. No, to the Rescue on Gang of Six Debt Compromise Deal - The Daily Beast: "Coburn seized center stage when he announced that he had returned to the disbanded “Gang of Six” debt talks after bolting from the negotiations in June. “I’m back,” he said to applause in a closed-door meeting of nearly 50 Democrats and Republicans."

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You know women have arrived when a wingnut male dares her to fight face to face

Rep. West blasts Wasserman Schultz as 'despicable' in email - TheHill.com: "West wrote. “You are the most vile, unprofessional ,and despicable member of the US House of Representatives. If you have something to say to me, stop being a coward and say it to my face, otherwise, shut the heck up. Focus on your own congressional district!”" And I have little doubt Debbie could hold up her end. But give West credit. He had the courage to challenge her. Anyone who believes the nation should be destroyed needs all the credit he can get.


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How much music can be contained in the simplest expressions (Video)


James Blake Lindisfarne I and II Live Austin

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Now whose side should we be on on this when anyone with a scintilla of intelligence knows football is lethal

NFL Sued for Allegedly Concealing Brain Injury Risks | TMZ.com: "Seventy-five former professional football players are suing the NFL, claiming it intentionally concealed the harmful effects of game-related concussions for NINETY YEARS."



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Migraines are clearly traceable to marital decisions and if they are named Marcus watch out

Michele Bachmann faces more migraine questions - Kasie Hunt and Molly Ball - POLITICO.com: "“On multiple occasions, we had to basically turn out the lights in her office, shut the door, and put a virtual do-not-disturb sign on her office for hours on end so she could lie there and try to recuperate from the headaches,” according to the staffer." I'm serious. Why isn't the biggest and most virulent headache known to man or woman due to the most important wrong decision they ever made. I mean if you opted in and knew you would end up with a phony clinic and a zillion foster children wouldn't you run for office and grind your teeth too? Maybe Freud was right about the unconscious mind.


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Yo Adele cool song Spotify Break (Video)


Great image too.
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Famine and global warming will make notices like this unbearable to read

UN declares famine in parts of Somalia - Africa - Al Jazeera English: "The United Nations has declared a state of famine in some parts of southern Somalia where the worst drought in over half a century is already being blamed for thousands of deaths." We so badly need a revaluation of our values. Values are willed and are the only thing that can turn a human tide. Our inherited values make no provision for the need to keep people alive while they are ... alive. We hide the evidence of deaths. Or we wait until inevitability creates news. The values that would work are democracy and tolerance and helpfulness and making all of them subservient to attention to the one Jesus called Abba. Unfortunately this common sense has been preempted by religion and integrated into the terrible value system that has been in force since Aristotle and theology made it standard. That would be the one that thinks characteristics are values and does not understand values are willed.

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Well I think England just might be shaking a little bit now (Video)


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I need to break out ergo Spotify breaks

Just to explain the spate of posts tagged Spotify breaks. I do nothing lightly when it comes to online. So when I plunked down five bucks a month for Spotify having no devices or anything but this pc and a  little netbook, I realized I was tapped out on a lifetime of music. I write the stuff. It is my natural talent. But I get to the point where I need to crash into all the stuff I have ignored. So I use the STAR thing on Spotify to flag whatever catches my ear and grab the best video I can find from YouTube and post it here. It takes no time at all. Some is old. More and more is new to me. And I enjoy almost everything I put up. Wherefore it behooves you, if you are looking for things you may not know , to click the spotify break or video tag sometimes.

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Lucretious makes more sense in four lines than all the proselytizers in the world

Remarkable Lines from Lucretius | Stephen C. Rose:

"I own with reason: for, if men but knew
Some fixed end to ills, they would be strong
By some device unconquered to withstand
Religions and the menacings of seers."


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Some age others are ageless Leonard Cohen is among the latter (Video)


There is a crack in everything / That's how the light gets in


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Methinks Mr. Cameron may be just a trice more than vilnerable

Hacking: UK premier accused of 'catastrophic error' - World news - Europe - msnbc.com: "The leader of the U.K.'s opposition party accused prime minister David Cameron of a 'deliberate attempt to hide from the facts' about an aide arrested over phone-hacking in a stormy debate in the parliament Wednesday." We may just be seeing the end of one of the shortest Conservative administrations ever in the shadow of Big Ben.

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Life goes on here still Frankie old gravel voice (Video)


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Dumbest budget solution of all

Amend Constitution to balance budgets? No, experts say | McClatchy: "But experts left, right and center warn that however appealing the idea may sound, it's highly impractical in reality. And it would make economic crises such as the one in 2008 much worse by tying the government's hands when intervention is needed most."


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If we are to sing about the South Land, what better way? (Video)


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Ah now 80 percent of GOP is sane

Hullabaloo: "More than eight in 10 — including 80 percent of Republicans — say there will be serious harm to the U.S. economy if the government cannot continue to borrow money to fund its operations and pay its debts after Aug. 2." I thought so. This time I doubt that there will be much celebration. We have had enough of the congressional histrionics. We just might rid the congress of these retards.

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Don McLean keeps keeping on (Video)



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Just in case you missed what the stupid Republicans were/are trying to do

Cut, Cap And Balance: House Passes Tea Party-Backed Debt Ceiling Plan: "Republicans say the proposal is just the kind of shot in the arm needed to address the nation's staggering $14.4 trillion debt. Specifically, it calls for cutting more than $100 billion in fiscal 2012 and makes drastic spending cuts in areas that Democrats have prioritized as opportunities for investment: clean energy, infrastructure, education and job training. The biggest concern for Democrats, however, is the bill's proposal to gut Medicaid funding by one-third over the next decade."

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Willie Steve Goodman The Beat Goes On Video


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Malawi Wednesday? That would be today

Malawi: Arab Spring Spreading South of the Sahara? · Global Voices: "It's winter in Africa, south of the Equator, but the temperature in Malawi feels more like Spring - particularly that of the recent Arab pedigree. The Malawian air is rife with tension and anxiety over what is expected to be a clash between civil society and the Malawi government on Wednesday July 20, 2011." Ah this will be global. Around 2012 it might even come to full flower here in the difficult US of A. It is happening because of the Internet. It cannot be stopped. It is like a colander with a zillion apertures. It will unleash the value democracy within every living soul. It will make every fatuous use of the word freedom even more absurd unless it is linked with ... democracy.

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Yes well it's time for a re-baptism musically so (Video)


Nothings gonna bring me down....


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No one should be strapped for time

In U.S., 3 in 10 Working Adults Are Strapped for Time The solution is to give everyone the time they need and restructure employment to fit the person. This would lead to more flexibility, more jobs, more happiness and more freedom. This could be done with no legislation at any level.

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If enough normal Republicans object would it change the wingnuts?

Daily Kos :: State of the Nation: "There is also growing dissatisfaction among Republicans with the hard-line stance of their congressional representatives: Fifty-eight percent say their leaders are not doing enough to strike a deal, up from 42 percent in March." Let's see. 58 percent up from 42. Let's say it gets to 75 percent. On the basis of past history, I would say no. Republicans under duress do not worry about polls. They depend on big lies and Democratic ineptitude to win the day.


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Tunstall Black Horse Spotify Break


Yes I paid my $4.99 and expect to make it back by auditioning there and posting here. 

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Will Milton Friedman do as a scapegoat for dumb economic solutions that are still operative

ALEC Exposed: Milton Friedman's Little Shop of Horrors | Common Dreams: "In her groundbreaking book, The Shock Doctrine, Naomi Klein coined the term 'disaster capitalism' for the rapid-fire corporate re-engineering of societies still reeling from shock. The master of disaster? Privatization and free market guru Milton Friedman. Friedman advised governments in economic crisis to follow strict austerity measures, combining radical cuts in social services with the full-scale privatization of their more lucrative assets." Hey, if we know that something does not work and we do it who is to blame, the guy who was wrong in the first place of us for following his advice? The best way to get prosperous is tax everyone fairly and send the government-dissers back to the funny farms they came from.

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India irony a law to share blame for nuke disasters hobbles nuke development

During Hillary Clinton's India visit, nuclear power is front and center - CSMonitor.com: "But both Tellis and Mr. Karnad say India’s liability law remains a serious obstacle to the US-India nuclear deal actually delivering on its vision of US firms helping expand India's power sector, despite various workarounds being proposed by the Indian government. Both agree that Mr. Singh’s current government is too weak to get Parliament to change the law." It will take you five minutes of reading to figure this out. At the end you will perhaps agree that India is foolish to pin everything on a proven disaster-creator. That would be nuclear energy. This law may come back to help the nation.

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Five million cattle and zero green smarts

Drought and wildfire threaten America's cattle capital - CSMonitor.com: "The triple-digit temperatures, expected to result in the worst drought north-central Texas has ever experienced, follows spring wildfires, which scorched millions of acres that traditionally nourish the nation’s largest steer population – five million head of cattle." Let's see. Drought and triple digit temperatures and island nations in the Pacific disappearing and the House occupies itself with cosmetic bills designed to shut up puling Tea Party freshmen. This is a tri-connected sickness of such nauseating impact that dry heaves are in the mix. Really the world is dying of heat exhaustion and this headline is buried under Wendi Deng and debt nonsense. When the cattle start to drop maybe the warming detractors will at least notice.

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Go Serbia!

Serbia nabs war crimes suspect Goran Hadzic - CBS News: "Hadzic, the leader of Croatia's rebel Serbs during the country's 1991- 1995 war, has been on the run for eight years. He is wanted for atrocities stemming from the war, when he fought against Croatia's independence from the former Yugoslavia." They are cleaning up the mess. This is called retroactive justice. It is not much of a deterrent yet. But if it becomes more habitual it just might give monstrous dictators and warlords pause.

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Stealing the hearing

The Wendi Deng Show — BagNews: "So, instead of the solitary take-away of a pass-the-buck CEO and a nervous and obfuscating Murdoch son, a sympathetic co-star had a literally smashing world-wide introduction yesterday on “the Rupert Show,”, with that much mind share siphoned off by the much more mouthwatering storyline of “The Battle Cry of the Tiger Wife.”" And two kids in new Hampshire sent a buck to Obama to solve the debt crisis and s zillion celebrities took up bandwidth and things all went down as usual.


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Values are what make the world go round.

Values are what make the world go round. From the beginning we have placed a value on things that enable us to proceed with maximum hypocrisy in a world where truth is not absent just hidden.

The Web is a chance to revalue values. This is the century of the revaluation of values.

Clear vision of death tolls is one starting point. Each life is of equal value.

The operative values should be tolerance, democracy, helpfulness and non-idolatry. These are the drivers of progress.


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Characterization needlessly fixes someone in a straitjacket.

Naming generations is characterization.

Describing people as this or that is characterization.

 At worst characterization is a form of cursing or fixing or witchcraft. It is a denial of freedom. It is judging.

The use of active values to describe someone or a group is more salient.

Is someone tolerant?

Is someone helpful?

Is someone democratic?

Is someone non-Idolatrous?

Values can be willed. Characterization needlessly fixes someone in a straitjacket.



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RECCMENDATION Richard Gordon Quantum Touch

The Slow as Molasses Press