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	<guid isPermaLink="true">https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1923/everything-we-ever-wanted-to-know-about-personality</guid>
	<pubDate>Sat, 29 Apr 2017 12:50:31 -0400</pubDate>
	<link>https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1923/everything-we-ever-wanted-to-know-about-personality</link>
	<title><![CDATA[Everything we ever wanted to know about Personality]]></title>
	<description><![CDATA[<div><div><img alt="" height="24" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1812/master/" width="700"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><strong><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">Everything we ever wanted to know about Personality ~</span></span></strong></div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="24" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1812/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="525" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/345/b6926d0f16d9a90097d1b91096d64027/jpg" width="700"></div><div><span style="font-size: 16px;"><span style="color: #0000CD;"><strong>Thinking about personality and what it does for our lives is endless. I can&#39;t even imagine my life without personality -- Being Personal with Life ~</strong></span></span></div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.1 (1225.1)</span></span> THE evolutionary planets are the spheres of human origin, the initial worlds of the ascending mortal career. Urantia is your starting point; here you and your divine Thought Adjuster are joined in temporary union. You have been endowed with a perfect guide; therefore, if you will sincerely run the race of time and gain the final goal of faith, the reward of the ages shall be yours; you will be eternally united with your indwelling Adjuster. Then will begin your real life, the ascending life, to which your present mortal state is but the vestibule. Then will begin your exalted and progressive mission as finaliters in the eternity which stretches out before you. And throughout all of these successive ages and stages of evolutionary growth, there is one part of you that remains absolutely unaltered, and that is personality &mdash; permanence in the presence of change.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.2 (1225.2)</span></span> While it would be presumptuous to attempt the definition of personality, it may prove helpful to recount some of the things which are known about personality:</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.3 (1225.3) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">1●</span><span style="font-size: 10px;">.</span></span> Personality is that quality in reality which is bestowed by the Universal Father himself or by the Conjoint Actor, acting for the Father.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.4 (1225.4) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">2 ●</span><span style="font-size: 10px;">.</span></span> It may be bestowed upon any living energy system which includes mind or spirit.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.5 (1225.5) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">3 ●</span><span style="font-size: 10px;">.</span></span> It is not wholly subject to the fetters of antecedent causation. It is relatively creative or cocreative.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.6 (1225.6) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">4 ●</span><span style="font-size: 10px;">.</span></span> When bestowed upon evolutionary material creatures, it causes spirit to strive for the mastery of energy-matter through the mediation of mind.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.7 (1225.7) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">5 ●</span><span style="font-size: 10px;">.</span></span> Personality, while devoid of identity, can unify the identity of any living energy system.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.8 (1225.8) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">6 ●.</span></span> It discloses only qualitative response to the personality circuit in contradistinction to the three energies which show both qualitative and quantitative response to gravity.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.9 (1225.9) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">7 ●.</span></span> Personality is changeless in the presence of change.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.10 (1225.10) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">8 ●.</span></span> It can make a gift to God &mdash; dedication of the free will to the doing of the will of God.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.11 (1225.11) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">9 ●.</span></span> It is characterized by morality &mdash; awareness of relativity of relationship with other persons. It discerns conduct levels and choosingly discriminates between them.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.12 (1225.12) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">10 ●.</span></span> Personality is unique, absolutely unique: It is unique in time and space; it is unique in eternity and on Paradise; it is unique when bestowed &mdash; there are no duplicates; it is unique during every moment of existence; it is unique in relation to God &mdash; he is no respecter of persons, but neither does he add them together, for they are nonaddable &mdash; they are associable but nontotalable.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.13 (1226.1) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">11 ●.</span></span> Personality responds directly to other-personality presence.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.14 (1226.2) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">12 ●.</span></span> It is one thing which can be added to spirit, thus illustrating the primacy of the Father in relation to the Son. (Mind does not have to be added to spirit.)</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.15 (1226.3) </span><span style="font-size: 16px;">13 ●.</span></span><span style="color: #D3D3D3;"><span style="font-size: 10px;"> </span></span>Personality may survive mortal death with identity in the surviving soul. The Adjuster and the personality are changeless; the relationship between them (in the soul) is nothing but change, continuing evolution; and if this change (growth) ceased, the soul would cease.</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">112:0.16&nbsp;(1226.4)&nbsp;</span><span style="font-size: 16px;">14●.</span></span>&nbsp;Personality&nbsp;is&nbsp;uniquely&nbsp;conscious&nbsp;of&nbsp;time,&nbsp;and&nbsp;this&nbsp;is&nbsp;something&nbsp;other&nbsp;than&nbsp;the&nbsp;time&nbsp;</div><div>perception&nbsp;of&nbsp;mind&nbsp;or&nbsp;spirit.</div><div><img alt="" height="24" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1812/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div>]]></description>
	<dc:creator>Bill Bricker</dc:creator>
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	<guid isPermaLink="true">https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1921/wikitribune-%E2%97%8F-a-new-kind-of-news-platform</guid>
	<pubDate>Sat, 29 Apr 2017 00:21:28 -0400</pubDate>
	<link>https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1921/wikitribune-%E2%97%8F-a-new-kind-of-news-platform</link>
	<title><![CDATA[WikiTRIBUNE ● A new kind of news platform.]]></title>
	<description><![CDATA[<p><a href="https://www.wikitribune.com"><img alt="" height="525" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1912/master/" width="700"></a></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"><strong>A new kind of news platform</strong></span></span>.</p><p><br />
Wikitribune is a news platform that brings journalists and a community of volunteers together.<br />
We want to make sure that you read fact-based articles that have a real impact in both local and global events. And that stories can be easily verified and improved.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="339" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1916/master/" width="400"><img alt="" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/"></p><p><strong><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 22px;">Why?&nbsp;</span></span></strong></p><p><span style="color: #FF0000;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"><strong>The news is broken and we can fix it.</strong></span></span><br />
We&rsquo;re bringing genuine community control to our news with unrestricted access for all. We&rsquo;re developing a living, breathing tool that&rsquo;ll present accurate information with real evidence, so that you can confidently make up your own mind.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #40E0D0;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"><strong>Great, but what will set WikiTribune apart from other news platforms?</strong></span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; text-align: center;"></p><p><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"><strong>1. See the source.&nbsp;</strong></span></span>Facts can be presented with bias, taken out of context and most recently a lot of facts are just plain&hellip;made-up. Supporting Wikitribune means ensuring that journalists only write articles based on facts that they can verify. Oh, and that you can see their sources. That way you can make up your own mind.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="339" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1917/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; text-align: center;" width="400"></p><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; text-align: center;"></p><p><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"><strong>2. Free and ad-free.</strong></span></span></p><p>WikiTribune is 100% ad-free, no one&rsquo;s relying on clicks to appease advertisers; no one&rsquo;s got a vested interest in anything other than giving you real news. There&rsquo;s no paywall, so anyone can read Wikitribune. Anyone can flag or fix an article and submit it for review.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; text-align: center;"></p><p><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"><strong>3. Community and journalists are equals.</strong></span></span></p><p><br />
In most news sites, the community tends to hang at the bottom of articles in comments that serve little purpose. We believe the community can play a more important role in news. Wikitribune puts community at the top, literally.</p><p><br />
Articles are authored, fact-checked, and verified by professional journalists and community members working side by side as equals, and supported not primarily by advertisers, but by readers who care about good journalism enough to become monthly supporters.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="315" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1918/master/" width="400"></p><p style="text-align: center;"><br />
<img alt="" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; text-align: center;"></p><p><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"><strong>4. Full transparency &ndash; know where your money goes.</strong></span></span></p><p><br />
Wikitribune is transparent about the way it operates and will publish its financials regularly. With Wikitribune your support will have more impact as most of the funds are used for paying journalists rather than expensive offices.<br />
On that note, if we don&rsquo;t reach our goal, of 10 journalists hired, we will refund all our supporters (minus transaction fees).</p><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; text-align: center;"></p><p><span style="color: #40E0D0;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"><strong>You are the editor. Radical idea?</strong></span></span></p><p><br />
<span style="color: #40E0D0;"><strong>Wikitribune takes professional, standards-based journalism and incorporates the radical idea from the world of Wiki that a community of volunteers can and will reliably protect and improve articles.</strong></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><br />
<img alt="" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; text-align: center;"></p><p><span style="color: #4B0082;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"><strong>Monthly subscriptions</strong></span></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #4B0082;"><span style="font-size: 22px;"><strong><img alt="" height="320" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1919/master/" width="400"></strong></span></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #4B0082;">In order to deliver on our promise, we need people who care about good journalism. People like you. Support us in our mission to bring you transparent facts and we&rsquo;ll build something constructive, something which outwits the prevalence of untrustworthy news sources.</span></strong></p><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; text-align: center;"></p><p><br />
By donating to our campaign, you&rsquo;ll play a critical part in an energetic surge towards media honesty. It&rsquo;s a movement that we believe will eventually obliterate low-rent, unreliable news for good. We want to raise enough money up front to get us started &ndash; but we need your regular commitment to make sure we can keep improving and delivering on giving you real news.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; text-align: center;"></p><p><br />
<span style="font-size: 16px;"><strong>&ldquo;A news site with a<br />
sense of community.&rdquo;</strong></span></p><p><img alt="" height="386" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1913/master/" width="300"><br />
<strong>Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia<br />
Wikitribune is led by Jimmy Wales who has surrounded himself with an amazing group of people to bring Wikitribune to life.</strong></p><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.wikitribune.com/become-supporter"><img alt="Become a Supporter" height="61" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1870/master/" width="313"></a></p><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.wikitribune.com/become-supporter"><span style="color: #40E0D0;"><strong>Become a Supporter</strong></span></a></p>]]></description>
	<dc:creator>i Witness NEWS</dc:creator>
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	<guid isPermaLink="true">https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1897/jeremy-corbyn-is-britain%E2%80%99s-best-hope</guid>
	<pubDate>Fri, 28 Apr 2017 12:48:11 -0400</pubDate>
	<link>https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1897/jeremy-corbyn-is-britain%E2%80%99s-best-hope</link>
	<title><![CDATA[Jeremy Corbyn is Britain’s Best Hope]]></title>
	<description><![CDATA[<p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;"><img alt="" height="24" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1812/master/" style="font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;"><a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/afghanistan-mazar-e-sharif-attack-us-backed-regime-suffers-another-setback/5586978"><img alt="" height="90" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1868/master/" style="font-size: 14.4px;" width="270"></a><img alt="" height="90" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1866/master/" style="font-size: 14.4px;" width="192"><a href="http://tv.globalresearch.ca/" style="font-size: 14.4px;"><img alt="" height="90" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1867/master/" style="font-size: 14.4px;" width="238"></a></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;"><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-size: 14.4px;" width="700">By&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/author/colin-todhunter" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" title="Posts by Colin Todhunter">Colin Todhunter</a></p><div style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 12px; float: left; color: rgb(54, 47, 45);"><div style="font-size: 12px;"><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; float: left; color: rgb(54, 47, 45);"><div style="font-size: 12px; color: rgb(153, 153, 153);">Global Research, April 28, 2017</div></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; float: right; text-align: right; color: rgb(54, 47, 45);"><div style="font-size: inherit;">Region:&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/region/europe" rel="tag" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);">Europe</a></div><div style="font-size: inherit;">Theme:&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/theme/poverty-social-inequality" rel="tag" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);">Poverty &amp; Social Inequality</a>,&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/theme/9-11-war-on-terrorism" rel="tag" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);">Terrorism</a>,&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/theme/us-nato-war-agenda" rel="tag" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(27, 20, 100);">US NATO War Agenda</a></div><div style="font-size: inherit;">In-depth Report:&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/indepthreport/syria-nato-s-next-war" rel="tag" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);">SYRIA: NATO&#39;S NEXT WAR?</a></div></div></div></div><div style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 12px; float: right; text-align: right; color: rgb(54, 47, 45);"><div style="font-size: inherit;">&nbsp;</div></div><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;"><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><h2 style="margin: 10px 15px 13px 22px; font-style: normal; font-size: 24px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 36px;"><span style="color: #0000FF;">Jeremy Corbyn is Britain&rsquo;s Best Hope</span></span></h2><p style="margin-bottom: 15px; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;"><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><div id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_10694" style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><div dir="ltr" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_10693" style="font-size: inherit;"><div style="margin: 5px 8px 5px -38px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; float: left; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><img alt="" height="403" src="http://www.globalresearch.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Labour-Party-leader-Jeremy-Corbyn-400x403.jpg" style="margin-bottom: 10px; font-size: inherit;" width="400"></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_10696" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><em style="font-size: inherit;">British&nbsp;<strong style="font-size: inherit;">Foreign Secretary&nbsp;Boris Johnson&nbsp;</strong>has suggested the UK could join US military action against the Syrian government without parliamentary approval. Johnson said he and&nbsp;<strong style="font-size: inherit;">PM Theresa May</strong>&nbsp;agreed that in the event of another chemical attack by the Assad regime, it would be hard for the UK to refuse any request to join military action.</em></p></div></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">No evidence has been provided that the Syrian government was responsible for the recent attack. If anything, as with the previous&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/evidence-that-syria-chemical-attacks-weapons-attack-were-staged-by-jihadists-un-team/5544804" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">alleged chemical weapons attack</a>&nbsp;in 2013, available evidence and logic would suggest it is the&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-dirty-war-on-syria/5491859" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">US-backed</a>&nbsp;terror groups trying to topple the government&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/fake-news-and-false-flags-against-syria-why-the-assad-government-most-likely-did-not-commit-the-gas-attacks-in-khan-shaykhun/5586223" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">that are responsible</a>&nbsp;and that the situation is part of the psych-ops being used to rally Western public support for direct military action against the Syrian government.</p></div></div></div></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Nevertheless, speaking on BBC Radio 4&rsquo;s Today programme,&nbsp;<a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/boris-johnson-uk-bypass-commons-vote-syria-military-action-us-mps-parliament-a7704761.html" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">Johnson said</a>:</p><blockquote style="margin-right: 3em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 3em; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal; font-size: inherit; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">&ldquo;If the United States has a proposal to have some sort of action in response to a chemical weapons attack, and if they come to us and ask for our support, whether it is with submarine cruise missiles in the Med or whatever it happens to be, in my view, and I know this is also the view of the prime minister, it would be very difficult for us to say no.&rdquo;</p></blockquote><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_13732" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">It appears the decision to bypass parliament and press ahead has already been made. Indeed, he continued by implying parliament might indeed be sidelined in the push to attack Syria. Asked if any UK strikes against&nbsp;Syria&nbsp;would need parliamentary approval, Johnson said:</p><blockquote style="margin-right: 3em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 3em; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal; font-size: inherit; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">&ldquo;How we exactly implement that would be for the government and for the prime minister to decide. But if the Americans were once again forced by the actions of the Assad regime and they asked us to help, it would be very difficult to say no.&rdquo;</p></blockquote><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><strong style="font-size: inherit;">Jeremy Corbyn</strong>, leader of the Labour Party, has rejected such action&nbsp;<a href="http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/15251883.Theresa_May_dismisses_Boris_Johnson___s_Syria_strike_suggestion_as____hypothetical___/" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">by stating</a>:</p><blockquote style="margin-right: 3em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 3em; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal; font-size: inherit; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">&ldquo;We don&rsquo;t need unilateral action. We need to work through the UN, but above all we need to bend ourselves totally to getting a political settlement in Syria.&rdquo;</p></blockquote><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Johnson has gone out of his way to portray Corbyn as weak and indecisive on military questions:</p><blockquote style="margin-right: 3em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 3em; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal; font-size: inherit; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_13740" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">&ldquo;There is a real risk that the government of a very great country could be handed over to a guy who has been hostile to Nato all his political career &hellip; who would disarm us of nuclear weapons, and a guy who has said he would not advocate a shoot-to-kill policy in the event of an Islamist terrorist putting innocent people&rsquo;s lives at risk.&rdquo;</p></blockquote></div></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_13741" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">He adds that Corbyn as PM would be &ldquo;calamitous&rdquo; in an &ldquo;age of uncertainty&rdquo; with growing threats from Russia, North Korea and Islamic terrorism.</p><div style="font-size: inherit;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_13790" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Johnson says:</p><blockquote style="margin-right: 3em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 3em; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal; font-size: inherit; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">&ldquo;In recent years we have seen an increase in the global tally of deaths from wars. We and our allies face threats from countries with a nuclear weapons capacity, and from those trying to acquire that capacity&hellip;&rdquo;</p></blockquote></div></div><div style="font-size: inherit;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><blockquote style="margin-right: 3em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 3em; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal; font-size: inherit; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_15381" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">&ldquo;For the first time for many years, some countries are trying to change European borders, not by agreement, but by force. And, as we have seen across Europe in recent months, we face a continued battle against terrorism and the hateful ideology of Islamic extremism.&rdquo;</p></blockquote><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Highlighting Corbyn&rsquo;s refusal to consider using the nuclear deterrent, he argues:</p><blockquote style="margin-right: 3em; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 3em; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal; font-size: inherit; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">&ldquo;There can be no more important task for a Government than to keep people safe &ndash; and we must be prepared to do everything necessary to do so.&rdquo;</p></blockquote><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><strong style="font-size: inherit;">Boris Johnson reading from the neocon script</strong></p><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_15382" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Before proceeding, if Johnson and others wish to attack Corbyn for his rejection of nuclear weapons and play some kind of point-scoring morality game, is it he and not Corbyn who is placing humanity in danger; it is he and not Corbyn who should think long and hard about the&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/power-and-the-nuclear-bomb-conducting-international-relations-with-the-threat-of-mass-murder/5537017" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">implications of threatening millions (or billions) with nuclear annihilation</a>; it is he and not Corbyn who should consider&nbsp;his dangerous anti-Russia rhetoric that is helping to push the world closer towards a nuclear precipice.</p><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_15383" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">There is no evidence linking the Syrian government to the recent chemical weapons attack, yet Johnson follows the lead of the Trump administration and its false narrative that has used that incident to intervene in Syria in an attempt to sway the war in favour of its terror groups.</p><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_15385" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Former US marine&nbsp;<a href="http://www.trueactivist.com/must-watch-ex-marine-goes-crazy-blows-whistle-on-syrian-false-flag-and-real-agenda/" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_15384" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">Ken O&rsquo;Keefe</a>&nbsp;says you have to be a bought-off &ldquo;prostitute&rdquo; or &ldquo;the dumbest of the dumb&rdquo; to believe the narrative coming out of Washington (humanitarian intervention to &lsquo;protect&rsquo; people from Assad) that the US really cares about the lives of ordinary citizens. The US-led West and its allies in the Middle East set out to destabilise Syria and remove Assad from power, which has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Syrians. Although the corporate media like to portray the whole situation as constituting a &lsquo;civil war&rsquo; and Western intervention being based on &lsquo;humanitarian&rsquo; concerns, it is clear by now that&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-dirty-war-on-syria/5491859" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">the US is waging a &lsquo;dirty war&rsquo;</a>&nbsp;to destroy Syria for&nbsp;<a href="http://www.theecologist.org/blogs_and_comments/commentators/2986471/syria_an_illegal_war_for_energy_capital_and_empire.html" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">geostrategic gain</a>.</p><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_15389" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Johnson is one of those &ldquo;prostitutes&rdquo; O&rsquo;Keefe speaks of. Like a toy monkey, he beats on cue the&nbsp;<a href="http://www.countercurrents.org/todhunter120315.htm" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">false narrative</a>&nbsp;coming from Washington&rsquo;s neocon regime about Syria, &lsquo;Russian aggression&rsquo; and Putin&rsquo;s desire to reshape Europe.</p></div></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_15390" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">We have seen an increasing tally of deaths due to various wars and the worlds is more unstable, as Johnson notes. What he fails to admit is the US and its client states, including Britain, have been responsible for the conflicts in Iraq, Syria, Libya and Afghanistan. US imperialist wars of aggression have resulted in death and destruction and failed states. Johnson misrepresents the situation by attempting to hide the reasons for&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/americas-gamble-wealth-war-and-power-russian-roulette-and-the-drive-to-nuclear-armageddon/5398617" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_15393" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">US militarism behind a fragile</a>&nbsp;narrative of Islamic terror (which undoubtedly exists but which should be regarded within the machinations of US empire and attacks on Islamic dominated countries), evil dictators and Russian aggression.</p></div></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_15391" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Johnson also throws in the North Korean &lsquo;threat&rsquo; for good measure despite the fact that small country has been involved in a rearguard action against a very real and&nbsp;<a href="http://www.4thmedia.org/2017/04/the-problem-is-washington-not-north-korea/" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">overwhelming US threat</a>&nbsp;for decades. The US has already decimated that nation once.</p><div style="font-size: inherit;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17099" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">What Johnson is serving up to the British public is the same old recipe of lies and hypocrisy that his predecessor&nbsp;<a href="http://www.countercurrents.org/todhunter290512.htm" id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17101" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank"><strong style="font-size: inherit;">William Hague</strong>&nbsp;offered</a>&nbsp;and what current&nbsp;<strong style="font-size: inherit;">Defence Secretary&nbsp;</strong><a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/cheerleader-for-us-aggression-against-russia-pushing-the-world-to-the-nuclear-brink-britains-defence-secretary-michael-fallon/5526384" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank"><strong style="font-size: inherit;">Michael Fallon</strong>&nbsp;excels in</a>. The aim is to try to keep the majority of the public on board with the dangerous &lsquo;great game&rsquo; the US is playing to secure its stated objective of remaining the dominant global force and weakening/destroying Russia. Washington will not allow multipolarity and aims to<a href="http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/11/02/forget-the-trump-clinton-charade-its-time-to-wake-up-america/" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">&nbsp;crush any perceived threats (not least the undermining of dollar hegemony)</a>&nbsp;to its global supremacy.</p></div></div><div style="font-size: inherit;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">From Ukraine and Syria to Libya and Afghanistan, the US is involved in geostrategic wars and conflicts, which, aside from resource plunder, are increasingly fueled by a crisis of capitalism:&nbsp;<a href="http://www.telesurtv.net/english/opinion/Global-Capitalist-Crisis-and-Trumps-War-Drive-20170418-0009.html" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">war and militarism are the defining features</a>&nbsp;of advanced capitalism as it increasingly struggles to find much profit in little else.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">When you have nothing else to offer the public &ndash; only living under the tyranny of a dying capitalism &ndash; repeating the mantra &lsquo;there is no alternative&rsquo; and instilling fear is all that&rsquo;s left. And, if it is not about Putin or some other made up threat, it is about Jeremy Corbyn.</p><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17102" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">When your policies have already jeopardized national security by inflicting terror on other countries; when you have already sold the economy to the lowest bidder and have attacked welfare, unions and livelihoods; when you have allowed massive levels of tax evasion/avoidance; when you and your neoliberal policies have allowed national and personal debt to spiral; when you have driven up the cost of living by handing over public assets to profiteering cartels; when you have flittered away taxpayers money to banks; when you allowed the richest 1,000 people in the UK to increase their wealth by 50% in 2009 alone while you impose &lsquo;austerity&rsquo; on everyone else &ndash; then what else can you offer but to roll out a good old dose of fear mongering about Corbyn simply because you have no actual argument?</p><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><div style="font-size: inherit;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><div style="font-size: inherit;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17104" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><strong style="font-size: inherit;">Conservative Party hypocrisy and crony capitalism</strong></p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><img alt="Image result for owen paterson" height="226" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/1758/1e47430d8bb67075a1fdb98ee168b8bc/jpg" style="margin-right: auto; margin-bottom: 10px; margin-left: auto; font-size: inherit;" width="362"></p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;">Owen Paterson</span></p><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17105" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Although certainly not exclusive to the Conservative Party, given how New Labour operated, hypocrisy and crony capitalism come natural to it. Millionaire&nbsp;<strong style="font-size: inherit;">Owen Paterson</strong>, a sitting MP and former environment, food and rural affairs minister, was a member of David Cameron&rsquo;s cabinet of millionaires. The Conservatives have been for decades waging a war on working people in the UK, which is currently sold as &lsquo;austerity&rsquo;.&nbsp;And the outcome has been predictable.</p><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17106" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">See&nbsp;<a href="http://www.trusselltrust.org/foodbank-figures-top-900000" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">this</a>&nbsp;about rising food poverty and increasing reliance on food banks in the UK.&nbsp;See&nbsp;<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/mar/17/oxfam-report-scale-britain-growing-financial-inequality" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">this</a>&nbsp;about the five richest families in Britain being worth more than the poorest 20%.&nbsp;See&nbsp;<a href="http://www.leftfutures.org/2015/05/aspiration-whats-in-it-for-the-20-million-in-poverty/" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">this</a>&nbsp;about one third of Britain&rsquo;s population being in poverty.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">According to&nbsp;<a href="http://www3.open.ac.uk/media/fullstory.aspx?id=27579" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">this report</a>, almost 18 million people cannot afford adequate housing conditions; 12 million are too poor to engage in common social activities; one in three cannot afford to heat their homes adequately in winter; and four million children and adults are not properly fed (Britain&rsquo;s population is estimated at 63 to 64 million).</p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Welfare cuts have&nbsp;<a href="http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/apr/29/poverty-child-rising-welfare-cuts-tory-claims" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">pushed hundreds of thousands below the poverty line</a>&nbsp;since 2012, including more than 300,000 children.</p><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17107" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">But Paterson really feels the pain of the poor &ndash; in faraway lands that is. He will even travel around the world to&nbsp;<a href="http://www.countercurrents.org/todhunter230215.htm" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">attend conferences</a>&nbsp;to shout about his concern for the poor on behalf of transnational agribusiness interests. His indifference to poverty in the UK is in marked contrast to his concern about the poor abroad. The indifference suddenly becomes transformed only when there is an opportunity to line the pockets of the global agritech companies.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Then there is&nbsp;<strong style="font-size: inherit;">Liam Fox</strong>&nbsp;who belongs to Theresa May&rsquo;s cabinet.&nbsp;Writing in&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/02/corporate-dark-money-power-atlantic-lobbyists-brexit" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">The Guardian</a>,&nbsp;<strong style="font-size: inherit;">George Monbiot</strong>&nbsp;describes how a discredited Fox has been central to cementing firm links with US corporate interests via The Heritage Foundation. The story Monbiot outlines is one of Fox&rsquo;s associations with US banking, oil, agribusiness, pharmaceutical and tobacco interests which have pursued an ultra-conservative economic agenda based on deregulation and the capturing of legislative processes.</p><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17108" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Monbiot notes that The Heritage Foundation is now at the heart of Trump&rsquo;s administration.&nbsp;Under Theresa May, the trade treaties that Fox is charged with could plug the UK into US food and environmental standards, which tend&nbsp;to be lower than Britain&rsquo;s and will become lower still if Trump gets his way.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><img alt="" height="400" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/1758/a71e0586e9ca2eca087494769bfec54c/jpg" style="margin-left: 5px; font-size: inherit; float: right;" width="311"></p><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17109" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Monbiot concludes that this is part of what Brexit was about: European laws protecting the public interest were portrayed by Conservative eurosceptics as intolerable intrusions on corporate freedom. Taking back control from Europe means closer integration with the US. The transatlantic special relationship is based on political and corporate power. That power is cemented by the networks&nbsp;Fox&nbsp;helped to develop.</p></div></div><div style="font-size: inherit;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17112" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Aside from Paterson and Fox, there are many other examples that could be provided to highlight the hypocrisy and grubby backroom deals that the Conservatives excel in, not least the&nbsp;<a href="http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-335b-The-party-of-the-crony-capitalists#.WQLqBGnyvIU" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">ongoing privatisation</a>&nbsp;of the NHS. The unaccountable, interlocking directorate of financial-corporate interests that are driving the neoliberal agenda in Britain are many and are&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-2015-british-general-election-capitalisms-one-horse-race/5442040" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">deeply embedded</a>&nbsp;within the Conservative Party and more generally within the corridors of Whitehall power.</p><div style="font-size: inherit;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17111" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><strong style="font-size: inherit;">Jeremy Corbyn Britain&rsquo;s best hope</strong></p></div></div><div style="font-size: inherit;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17110" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Corbyn offers an alternative that challenges the &lsquo;Washington consensus&rsquo;.&nbsp;He stands on an anti-war and anti-austerity platform, is committed to investing in the public sector, wants to get rid of Britain&rsquo;s nuclear weapons and says he wants to renationalise profiteering public sector utilities.</p><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17166" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Jeremy Corbyn is a credible alternative to the current crop of mainstream politicians &ndash; whether Blairite Labour, Conservative or Lib-Dem &ndash; not just because of what he says but because of the reactions he elicits from this bunch of discredited and corrupt pro-austerity, pro-war, pro City of London/Wall Street, union-bashing, welfare cutting handmaidens to the rich that have ruined the economy and have helped to devastate countries across the globe with their penchant for militarism.</p></div></div><div style="font-size: inherit;"><div dir="ltr" style="font-size: inherit;"><p id="yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1493380932090_17169" style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;">Whether Corbyn could actually stem to tide of militarism and neoliberalism if elected PM is highly debatable, given the pressure he would face to tow the Establishment line and the forces lined up against him (see&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/can-jeremy-corbyn-stem-the-tide-of-neoliberalism-and-militarism/5475948" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" target="_blank">this</a>). He would however at least offer a degree of hope for positive change.&nbsp;The only danger to Britain and the world is US militarism and its wars of aggression, not Jeremy Corbyn. But Boris Johnson&rsquo;s rhetoric and that of his millionaire cronies in government depends on the British public remaining blind to the chains that enslave them.</p></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 15px; color: rgb(54, 47, 45); text-align: justify;"><div style="font-size: 12px;">The original source of this article is Global Research</div><div style="font-size: 12px;">Copyright &copy;&nbsp;<a href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/author/colin-todhunter" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);" title="Posts by Colin Todhunter">Colin Todhunter</a>, Global Research, 2017</div><hr><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/GlobalResearchCRG" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);"><strong style="font-size: inherit;">Comment on Global Research Articles on our Facebook page</strong></a></p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><a href="https://store.globalresearch.ca/member/" style="font-size: inherit; color: rgb(59, 77, 129);"><strong style="font-size: inherit;">Become a Member of Global Research</strong></a></p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit; text-align: center;"><a href="https://store.globalresearch.ca/donate/"><img alt="" height="61" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/1758/6d97911e5540e6110723aeedeb8a6ba9/gif" width="313"></a></p><p style="margin-bottom: 14px; font-size: inherit;"><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1814/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>]]></description>
	<dc:creator>i Witness NEWS</dc:creator>
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	<guid isPermaLink="true">https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1889/seeds-in-the-wind</guid>
	<pubDate>Thu, 27 Apr 2017 13:55:11 -0400</pubDate>
	<link>https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1889/seeds-in-the-wind</link>
	<title><![CDATA[Seeds in the Wind]]></title>
	<description><![CDATA[<div><div><img alt="" height="24" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1812/master/" width="700"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 24px;"><strong>Seeds in the Wind ~</strong></span></span></div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="24" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1812/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div><div><img alt="" height="466" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/345/0754952bedcde7231480fb7b81d1b9ff/jpg" width="700"></div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" width="700"></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><img alt="" height="150" src="https://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/6877/master/" style="float: left;" width="150">It seems we are all trying our best to face this religious challenge, described in the quote from the Urantia Book below. It does take courage to stand up and stand firm in your beliefs -- and learned and earned personal Spiritual Values. It never seems easy, but it is the easiest of paths once you start out and get a few miles in that heart and mind we use to test the winds of Truth.</div></div><div><div>&nbsp;</div></div><div><div>Love is the path, and it does take inner-strength to stand firm at times. At other times we share with anyone interested in our truths we find along the way.</div></div><div><div>&nbsp;</div></div><div><div>I love to pass around the good energy of Spiritual values anytime I get a chance. Words are like seeds in the wind. They fly around in our minds and thoughts until they find that perfect place that is just right for growth. And they grow in the roots of our Being as Spiritual Values of Truth, Beauty and Goodness, manifested in real life as Love.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" src="https://spiritualfamily.net/images/Bars/Bar-00-break-c.png"></div></div><div><div>&nbsp;</div></div><div><div><a href="http://forum.spiritualfamily.net/viewtopic.php?f=47&amp;t=2472&amp;sid=0f6dc32b595fc3922adc2fe6419be1d5"><strong><span style="font-size: 12px;"><span style="color: #0000CD;"><img alt="" height="100" src="https://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/3770/master/" style="float: left;" width="100">~ 2:7:10 [#1] Urantia Book</span></span></strong></a></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0099ff;">The religious challenge of this age is to those farseeing and forward-looking men and women of spiritual insight who will dare to construct a new and appealing philosophy of living out of the enlarged and exquisitely integrated modern concepts of cosmic truth, universe beauty, and divine goodness. Such a new and righteous vision of morality will attract all that is good in the mind of man and challenge that which is best in the human soul. Truth, beauty, and goodness are divine realities, and as man ascends the scale of spiritual living, these supreme qualities of the Eternal become increasingly co-ordinated and unified in God, who is love.</span></div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div><div>&nbsp;</div></div>]]></description>
	<dc:creator>Bill Bricker</dc:creator>
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	<guid isPermaLink="true">https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1857/the-end-of-capitalism-has-begun</guid>
	<pubDate>Tue, 25 Apr 2017 20:57:58 -0400</pubDate>
	<link>https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1857/the-end-of-capitalism-has-begun</link>
	<title><![CDATA[The end of capitalism has begun!]]></title>
	<description><![CDATA[<p><img alt="" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/1758/4b5fd31c1dcb0c4eadb22f9c0f9cd525/png"></p><p><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/profile/paul-mason"><img alt="" height="80" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/1758/99de8e22e8b43c8a2e4eb2a78a6da2a8/png" width="249"></a></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><span style="float: left; font-weight: 200; margin-right: 0.3125rem; color: rgb(149, 28, 85);"><span style="font-size: 5.25rem; vertical-align: text-top;">T</span></span>he red flags and marching songs of&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/syriza" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">Syriza</a>&nbsp;during the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/debt-crisis" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">Greek crisis</a>, plus the expectation that</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">the banks would be nationalised, revived briefly a 20th-century dream: the forced destruction of the market from above. For much of the 20th century this was how the left conceived the first stage of an economy beyond capitalism. The force would be applied by the working class, either at the ballot box or on the barricades. The lever would be the state. The opportunity would come through frequent episodes of economic collapse.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Instead over the past 25 years it has been the left&rsquo;s project that has collapsed. The market destroyed the plan; individualism replaced collectivism and solidarity; the hugely expanded workforce of the world looks like a &ldquo;proletariat&rdquo;, but no longer thinks or behaves as it once did.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">If you lived through all this, and disliked capitalism, it was traumatic. But in the process technology has created a new route out, which the remnants of the old left &ndash; and all other forces influenced by it &ndash; have either to embrace or die. Capitalism, it turns out, will not be abolished by forced-march techniques. It will be abolished by creating something more dynamic that exists, at first, almost unseen within the old system, but which will break through, reshaping the economy around new values and behaviours. I call this postcapitalism.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEzSzptjS40</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: rgb(118, 118, 118); font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">&nbsp;Watch: Capitalism is failing, and it&rsquo;s time to panic</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">As with the end of feudalism 500 years ago, capitalism&rsquo;s replacement by postcapitalism will be accelerated by external shocks and shaped by the emergence of a new kind of human being. And it has started.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Postcapitalism is possible because of three major changes information technology has brought about in the past 25 years. First, it has reduced the need for work, blurred the edges between work and free time and loosened the relationship between work and wages. The coming wave of automation, currently stalled because our social infrastructure cannot bear the consequences, will hugely diminish the amount of work needed &ndash; not just to subsist but to provide a decent life for all.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Second, information is corroding the market&rsquo;s ability to form prices correctly. That is because markets are based on scarcity while information is abundant. The system&rsquo;s defence mechanism is to form monopolies &ndash; the giant tech companies &ndash; on a scale not seen in the past 200 years, yet they cannot last. By building business models and share valuations based on the capture and privatisation of all socially produced information, such firms are constructing a fragile corporate edifice at odds with the most basic need of humanity, which is to use ideas freely.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Third, we&rsquo;re seeing the spontaneous rise of collaborative production: goods, services and organisations are appearing that no longer respond to the dictates of the market and the managerial hierarchy. The biggest information product in the world &ndash;&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/wikipedia" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">Wikipedia</a>&nbsp;&ndash; is made by volunteers for free, abolishing the encyclopedia business and depriving the advertising industry of an estimated $3bn a year in revenue.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Almost unnoticed, in the niches and hollows of the market system, whole swaths of economic life are beginning to move to a different rhythm. Parallel currencies, time banks, cooperatives and self-managed spaces have proliferated, barely noticed by the economics profession, and often as a direct result of the shattering of the old structures in the post-2008 crisis.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">You only find this new economy if you look hard for it. In Greece, when a grassroots NGO mapped the country&rsquo;s food co-ops, alternative producers, parallel currencies and local exchange systems they found more than 70 substantive projects and hundreds of smaller initiatives ranging from squats to carpools to free kindergartens. To mainstream economics such things seem barely to qualify as economic activity &ndash; but that&rsquo;s the point. They exist because they trade, however haltingly and inefficiently, in the currency of postcapitalism: free time, networked activity and free stuff. It seems a meagre and unofficial and even dangerous thing from which to craft an entire alternative to a global system, but so did money and credit in the age of Edward III.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><img alt="" height="360" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/1758/506db95d2394718aaa888f1e11f9bc73/jpeg" width="600"></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: rgb(118, 118, 118); font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Sharing the fruits of our labour. Illustration by Joe Magee</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">New forms of ownership, new forms of lending, new legal contracts: a whole business subculture has emerged over the past 10 years, which the media has dubbed the &ldquo;sharing economy&rdquo;. Buzzwords such as the &ldquo;commons&rdquo; and &ldquo;peer-production&rdquo; are thrown around, but few have bothered to ask what this development means for capitalism itself.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">I believe it offers an escape route &ndash; but only if these micro-level projects are nurtured, promoted and protected by a fundamental change in what governments do. And this must be driven by a change in our thinking &ndash; about technology, ownership and work. So that, when we create the elements of the new system, we can say to ourselves, and to others: &ldquo;This is no longer simply my survival mechanism, my bolt hole from the neoliberal world; this is a new way of living in the process of formation.&rdquo;</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">...</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The 2008 crash wiped 13% off global production and 20% off global trade. Global growth became negative &ndash; on a scale where anything below +3% is counted as a recession. It produced, in the west, a depression phase longer than in 1929-33, and even now, amid a pallid recovery, has left mainstream economists terrified about the prospect of long-term stagnation. The aftershocks in Europe are tearing the continent apart.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The solutions have been austerity plus monetary excess. But they are not working. In the worst-hit countries, the pension system has been destroyed, the retirement age is being hiked to 70, and education is being privatised so that graduates now face a lifetime of high debt. Services are being dismantled and infrastructure projects put on hold.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Even now many people fail to grasp the true meaning of the word &ldquo;austerity&rdquo;. Austerity is not eight years of spending cuts, as in the UK, or even the social catastrophe inflicted on Greece. It means driving the wages, social wages and living standards in the west down for decades until they meet those of the middle class in China and India on the way up.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Meanwhile in the absence of any alternative model, the conditions for another crisis are being assembled. Real wages have fallen or remained stagnant in Japan, the southern Eurozone, the US and UK. The shadow banking system has been reassembled, and is now bigger than it was in 2008. New rules demanding banks hold more reserves have been watered down or delayed. Meanwhile, flushed with free money, the 1% has got richer.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Neoliberalism, then, has morphed into a system programmed to inflict recurrent catastrophic failures. Worse than that, it has broken the 200-year pattern of industrial capitalism wherein an economic crisis spurs new forms of technological innovation that benefit everybody.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">That is because neoliberalism was the first economic model in 200 years the upswing of which was premised on the suppression of wages and smashing the social power and resilience of the working class. If we review the take-off periods studied by long-cycle theorists &ndash; the 1850s in Europe, the 1900s and 1950s across the globe &ndash; it was the strength of organised labour that forced entrepreneurs and corporations to stop trying to revive outdated business models through wage cuts, and to innovate their way to a new form of capitalism.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The result is that, in each upswing, we find a synthesis of automation, higher wages and higher-value consumption. Today there is no pressure from the workforce, and the technology at the centre of this innovation wave does not demand the creation of higher-consumer spending, or the re‑employment of the old workforce in new jobs. Information is a machine for grinding the price of things lower and slashing the work time needed to support life on the planet.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">As a result, large parts of the business class have become neo-luddites. Faced with the possibility of creating gene-sequencing labs, they instead start coffee shops, nail bars and contract cleaning firms: the banking system, the planning system and late neoliberal culture reward above all the creator of low-value, long-hours jobs.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Innovation is happening but it has not, so far, triggered the fifth long upswing for capitalism that long-cycle theory would expect. The reasons lie in the specific nature of information technology.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">...</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">We&rsquo;re surrounded not just by intelligent machines but by a new layer of reality centred on information. Consider an airliner: a computer flies it; it has been designed, stress-tested and &ldquo;virtually manufactured&rdquo; millions of times; it is firing back real-time information to its manufacturers. On board are people squinting at screens connected, in some lucky countries, to the internet.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Seen from the ground it is the same white metal bird as in the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/jamesbond" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">James Bond</a>&nbsp;era. But it is now both an intelligent machine and a node on a network. It has an information content and is adding &ldquo;information value&rdquo; as well as physical value to the world. On a packed business flight, when everyone&rsquo;s peering at Excel or Powerpoint, the passenger cabin is best understood as an information factory.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><img alt="Is it utopian to believe we’re on the verge of an evolution beyond capitalism? Illustration by Joe Magee" height="317" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/1758/662691f5c7f002deaa4b19224d52d98c/jpeg" width="600"></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: rgb(118, 118, 118); font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Is it utopian to believe we&rsquo;re on the verge of an evolution beyond capitalism? Illustration by Joe Magee</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">But what is all this information worth? You won&rsquo;t find an answer in the accounts: intellectual property is valued in modern accounting standards by guesswork. A study for the SAS Institute in 2013 found that, in order to put a value on data, neither the cost of gathering it, nor the market value or the future income from it could be adequately calculated. Only through a form of accounting that included non-economic benefits, and risks, could companies actually explain to their shareholders what their data was really worth. Something is broken in the logic we use to value the most important thing in the modern world.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The great technological advance of the early 21st century consists not only of new objects and processes, but of old ones made intelligent. The knowledge content of products is becoming more valuable than the physical things that are used to produce them. But it is a value measured as usefulness, not exchange or asset value. In the 1990s economists and technologists began to have the same thought at once: that this new role for information was creating a new, &ldquo;third&rdquo; kind of capitalism &ndash; as different from industrial capitalism as industrial capitalism was to the merchant and slave capitalism of the 17th and 18th centuries. But they have struggled to describe the dynamics of the new &ldquo;cognitive&rdquo; capitalism. And for a reason. Its dynamics are profoundly non-capitalist.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">During and right after the second world war, economists viewed information simply as a &ldquo;public good&rdquo;. The US government even decreed that no profit should be made out of patents, only from the production process itself. Then we began to understand intellectual property. In 1962, Kenneth Arrow, the guru of mainstream economics, said that in a free market economy the purpose of inventing things is to create intellectual property rights. He noted: &ldquo;precisely to the extent that it is successful there is an underutilisation of information.&rdquo;</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">You can observe the truth of this in every e-business model ever constructed: monopolise and protect data, capture the free social data generated by user interaction, push commercial forces into areas of data production that were non-commercial before, mine the existing data for predictive value &ndash; always and everywhere ensuring nobody but the corporation can utilise the results.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">If we restate Arrow&rsquo;s principle in reverse, its revolutionary implications are obvious: if a free market economy plus intellectual property leads to the &ldquo;underutilisation of information&rdquo;, then an economy based on the full utilisation of information cannot tolerate the free market or absolute intellectual property rights. The business models of all our modern digital giants are designed to prevent the abundance of information.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Yet information is abundant. Information goods are freely replicable. Once a thing is made, it can be copied/pasted infinitely. A music track or the giant database you use to build an airliner has a production cost; but its cost of reproduction falls towards zero. Therefore, if the normal price mechanism of capitalism prevails over time, its price will fall towards zero, too.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">For the past 25 years economics has been wrestling with this problem: all mainstream economics proceeds from a condition of scarcity, yet the most dynamic force in our modern world is abundant and, as hippy genius Stewart Brand once put it, &ldquo;wants to be free&rdquo;.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">There is, alongside the world of monopolised information and surveillance created by corporations and governments, a different dynamic growing up around information: information as a social good, free at the point of use, incapable of being owned or exploited or priced. I&rsquo;ve surveyed the attempts by economists and business gurus to build a framework to understand the dynamics of an economy based on abundant, socially-held information. But it was actually imagined by one 19th-century economist in the era of the telegraph and the steam engine. His name?&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/karl-marx" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">Karl Marx</a>.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">...</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The scene is Kentish Town, London, February 1858, sometime around 4am. Marx is a wanted man in Germany and is hard at work scribbling thought-experiments and notes-to-self. When they finally get to see what Marx is writing on this night, the left intellectuals of the 1960s will admit that it &ldquo;challenges every serious interpretation of Marx yet conceived&rdquo;. It is called &ldquo;The Fragment on Machines&rdquo;.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">In the &ldquo;Fragment&rdquo; Marx imagines an economy in which the main role of machines is to produce, and the main role of people is to supervise them. He was clear that, in such an economy, the main productive force would be information. The productive power of such machines as the automated cotton-spinning machine, the telegraph and the steam locomotive did not depend on the amount of labour it took to produce them but on the state of social knowledge. Organisation and knowledge, in other words, made a bigger contribution to productive power than the work of making and running the machines.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Given what Marxism was to become &ndash; a theory of exploitation based on the theft of labour time &ndash; this is a revolutionary statement. It suggests that, once knowledge becomes a productive force in its own right, outweighing the actual labour spent creating a machine, the big question becomes not one of &ldquo;wages versus profits&rdquo; but who controls what Marx called the &ldquo;power of knowledge&rdquo;.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">In an economy where machines do most of the work, the nature of the knowledge locked inside the machines must, he writes, be &ldquo;social&rdquo;. In a final late-night thought experiment Marx imagined the end point of this trajectory: the creation of an &ldquo;ideal machine&rdquo;, which lasts forever and costs nothing. A machine that could be built for nothing would, he said, add no value at all to the production process and rapidly, over several accounting periods, reduce the price, profit and labour costs of everything else it touched.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Once you understand that information is physical, and that software is a machine, and that storage, bandwidth and processing power are collapsing in price at exponential rates, the value of Marx&rsquo;s thinking becomes clear. We are surrounded by machines that cost nothing and could, if we wanted them to, last forever.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">In these musings, not published until the mid-20th century, Marx imagined information coming to be stored and shared in something called a &ldquo;general intellect&rdquo; &ndash; which was the mind of everybody on Earth connected by social knowledge, in which every upgrade benefits everybody. In short, he had imagined something close to the information economy in which we live. And, he wrote, its existence would &ldquo;blow capitalism sky high&rdquo;.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="238" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/1758/a448856a0c7b1b9b86d86fb5b8c6ab86/png" width="224"></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">With the terrain changed, the old path beyond capitalism imagined by the left of the 20th century is lost.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">But a different path has opened up. Collaborative production, using network technology to produce goods and services that only work when they are free, or shared, defines the route beyond the market system. It will need the state to create the framework &ndash; just as it created the framework for factory labour, sound currencies and free trade in the early 19th century. The postcapitalist sector is likely to coexist with the market sector for decades, but major change is happening.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Networks restore &ldquo;granularity&rdquo; to the postcapitalist project. That is, they can be the basis of a non-market system that replicates itself, which does not need to be created afresh every morning on the computer screen of a commissar.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The transition will involve the state, the market and collaborative production beyond the market. But to make it happen, the entire project of the left, from protest groups to the mainstream social democratic and liberal parties, will have to be reconfigured. In fact, once people understand the logic of the postcapitalist transition, such ideas will no longer be the property of the left &ndash; but of a much wider movement, for which we will need new labels.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Who can make this happen? In the old left project it was the industrial working class. More than 200 years ago, the radical journalist John Thelwall warned the men who built the English factories that they had created a new and dangerous form of democracy: &ldquo;Every large workshop and manufactory is a sort of political society, which no act of parliament can silence, and no magistrate disperse.&rdquo;</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Today the whole of society is a factory. We all participate in the creation and recreation of the brands, norms and institutions that surround us. At the same time the communication grids vital for everyday work and profit are buzzing with shared knowledge and discontent. Today it is the network &ndash; like the workshop 200 years ago &ndash; that they &ldquo;cannot silence or disperse&rdquo;.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">True, states can shut down&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/facebook" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">Facebook</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/twitter" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">Twitter</a>, even the entire internet and mobile network in times of crisis, paralysing the economy in the process. And they can store and monitor every kilobyte of information we produce. But they cannot reimpose the hierarchical, propaganda-driven and ignorant society of 50 years ago, except &ndash; as in China, North Korea or Iran &ndash; by opting out of key parts of modern life. It would be, as sociologist Manuel Castells put it, like trying to de-electrify a country.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">By creating millions of networked people, financially exploited but with the whole of human intelligence one thumb-swipe away, info-capitalism has created a new agent of change in history: the educated and connected human being.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">...</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">This will be more than just an economic transition. There are, of course, the parallel and urgent tasks of decarbonising the world and dealing with demographic and fiscal timebombs. But I&rsquo;m concentrating on the economic transition triggered by information because, up to now, it has been sidelined. Peer-to-peer has become pigeonholed as a niche obsession for visionaries, while the &ldquo;big boys&rdquo; of leftwing economics get on with critiquing austerity.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><img alt="Information wants to be free. Illustration by Joe Magee" height="530" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/1758/a732b7155a09276822aca6317da60e2a/jpeg" width="600"></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">In fact, on the ground in places such as Greece, resistance to austerity and the creation of &ldquo;networks you can&rsquo;t default on&rdquo; &ndash; as one activist put it to me &ndash; go hand in hand. Above all, postcapitalism as a concept is about new forms of human behaviour that conventional economics would hardly recognise as relevant.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">So how do we visualise the transition ahead? The only coherent parallel we have is the replacement of feudalism by capitalism &ndash; and thanks to the work of epidemiologists, geneticists and data analysts, we know a lot more about that transition than we did 50 years ago when it was &ldquo;owned&rdquo; by social science. The first thing we have to recognise is: different modes of production are structured around different things. Feudalism was an economic system structured by customs and laws about &ldquo;obligation&rdquo;. Capitalism was structured by something purely economic: the market. We can predict, from this, that postcapitalism &ndash; whose precondition is abundance &ndash; will not simply be a modified form of a complex market society. But we can only begin to grasp at a positive vision of what it will be like.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">I don&rsquo;t mean this as a way to avoid the question: the general economic parameters of a postcapitalist society by, for example, the year 2075, can be outlined. But if such a society is structured around human liberation, not economics, unpredictable things will begin to shape it.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">For example, the most obvious thing to Shakespeare, writing in 1600, was that the market had called forth new kinds of behaviour and morality. By analogy, the most obvious &ldquo;economic&rdquo; thing to the Shakespeare of 2075 will be the total upheaval in gender relationships, or sexuality, or health. Perhaps there will not even be any playwrights: perhaps the very nature of the media we use to tell stories will change &ndash; just as it changed in Elizabethan London when the first public theatres were built.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Think of the difference between, say, Horatio in&nbsp;<a href="https://bookshop.theguardian.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=Hamlet&amp;order=relevance&amp;dir=desc" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);"><em>Hamlet</em></a>&nbsp;and a character such as Daniel Doyce in Dickens&rsquo;s&nbsp;<a href="https://bookshop.theguardian.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=Little+Dorrit&amp;order=relevance&amp;dir=desc" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);"><em>Little Dorrit</em></a>. Both carry around with them a characteristic obsession of their age &ndash; Horatio is obsessed with humanist philosophy; Doyce is obsessed with patenting his invention. There can be no character like Doyce in Shakespeare; he would, at best, get a bit part as a working-class comic figure. Yet, by the time Dickens described Doyce, most of his readers knew somebody like him. Just as Shakespeare could not have imagined Doyce, so we too cannot imagine the kind of human beings society will produce once economics is no longer central to life. But we can see their prefigurative forms in the lives of young people all over the world breaking down 20th-century barriers around sexuality, work, creativity and the self.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The feudal model of agriculture collided, first, with environmental limits and then with a massive external shock &ndash; the Black Death. After that, there was a demographic shock: too few workers for the land, which raised their wages and made the old feudal obligation system impossible to enforce. The labour shortage also forced technological innovation. The new technologies that underpinned the rise of merchant capitalism were the ones that stimulated commerce (printing and accountancy), the creation of tradeable wealth (mining, the compass and fast ships) and productivity (mathematics and the scientific method).</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Present throughout the whole process was something that looks incidental to the old system &ndash; money and credit &ndash; but which was actually destined to become the basis of the new system. In feudalism, many laws and customs were actually shaped around ignoring money; credit was, in high feudalism, seen as sinful. So when money and credit burst through the boundaries to create a market system, it felt like a revolution. Then, what gave the new system its energy was the discovery of a virtually unlimited source of free wealth in the Americas.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">A combination of all these factors took a set of people who had been marginalised under feudalism &ndash; humanists, scientists, craftsmen, lawyers, radical preachers and bohemian playwrights such as Shakespeare &ndash; and put them at the head of a social transformation. At key moments, though tentatively at first, the state switched from hindering the change to promoting it.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Today, the thing that is corroding capitalism, barely rationalised by mainstream economics, is information. Most laws concerning information define the right of corporations to hoard it and the right of states to access it, irrespective of the human rights of citizens. The equivalent of the printing press and the scientific method is information technology and its spillover into all other technologies, from genetics to healthcare to agriculture to the movies, where it is quickly reducing costs.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The modern equivalent of the long stagnation of late feudalism is the stalled take-off of the third industrial revolution, where instead of rapidly automating work out of existence, we are reduced to creating what David Graeber calls &ldquo;bullshit jobs&rdquo; on low pay. And many economies are stagnating.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The equivalent of the new source of free wealth? It&rsquo;s not exactly wealth: it&rsquo;s the &ldquo;externalities&rdquo; &ndash; the free stuff and wellbeing generated by networked interaction. It is the rise of non-market production, of unownable information, of peer networks and unmanaged enterprises. The internet, French economist Yann Moulier-Boutang says, is &ldquo;both the ship and the ocean&rdquo; when it comes to the modern equivalent of the discovery of the new world. In fact, it is the ship, the compass, the ocean and the gold.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The modern day external shocks are clear: energy depletion, climate change, ageing populations and migration. They are altering the dynamics of capitalism and making it unworkable in the long term. They have not yet had the same impact as the Black Death &ndash; but as we saw in New Orleans in 2005, it does not take the bubonic plague to destroy social order and functional infrastructure in a financially complex and impoverished society.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Once you understand the transition in this way, the need is not for a supercomputed Five Year Plan &ndash; but a project, the aim of which should be to expand those technologies, business models and behaviours that dissolve market forces, socialise knowledge, eradicate the need for work and push the economy towards abundance. I call it Project Zero &ndash; because its aims are a zero-carbon-energy system; the production of machines, products and services with zero marginal costs; and the reduction of necessary work time as close as possible to zero.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Most 20th-century leftists believed that they did not have the luxury of a managed transition: it was an article of faith for them that nothing of the coming system could exist within the old one &ndash; though the working class always attempted to create an alternative life within and &ldquo;despite&rdquo; capitalism. As a result, once the possibility of a Soviet-style transition disappeared, the modern left became preoccupied simply with opposing things: the privatisation of healthcare, anti-union laws, fracking &ndash; the list goes on.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">&nbsp;</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">If I am right, the logical focus for supporters of postcapitalism is to build alternatives within the system; to use governmental power in a radical and disruptive way; and to direct all actions towards the transition &ndash; not the defence of random elements of the old system. We have to learn what&rsquo;s urgent, and what&rsquo;s important, and that sometimes they do not coincide.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">...</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The power of imagination will become critical. In an information society, no thought, debate or dream is wasted &ndash; whether conceived in a tent camp, prison cell or the table football space of a startup company.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">As with virtual manufacturing, in the transition to postcapitalism the work done at the design stage can reduce mistakes in the implementation stage. And the design of the postcapitalist world, as with software, can be modular. Different people can work on it in different places, at different speeds, with relative autonomy from each other. If I could summon one thing into existence for free it would be a global institution that modelled capitalism correctly: an open source model of the whole economy; official, grey and black. Every experiment run through it would enrich it; it would be open source and with as many datapoints as the most complex climate models.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">The main contradiction today is between the possibility of free, abundant goods and information; and a system of monopolies, banks and governments trying to keep things private, scarce and commercial. Everything comes down to the struggle between the network and the hierarchy: between old forms of society moulded around capitalism and new forms of society that prefigure what comes next.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">...</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Is it utopian to believe we&rsquo;re on the verge of an evolution beyond capitalism? We live in a world in which gay men and women can marry, and in which contraception has, within the space of 50 years, made the average working-class woman freer than the craziest libertine of the Bloomsbury era. Why do we, then, find it so hard to imagine economic freedom?</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><img alt="" height="184" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/1758/01083c52316cfcd7d6e69c47f75a24f3/png" width="235"></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">It is the elites &ndash; cut off in their dark-limo world &ndash; whose project looks as forlorn as that of the millennial sects of the 19th century. The democracy of riot squads, corrupt politicians, magnate-controlled newspapers and the surveillance state looks as phoney and fragile as East Germany did 30 years ago.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">All readings of human history have to allow for the possibility of a negative outcome. It haunts us in the zombie movie, the disaster movie, in the post-apocalytic wasteland of films such as&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/movie/131971/road" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);"><em>The Road</em></a>&nbsp;or&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/aug/22/elysium-review" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);"><em>Elysium</em></a>. But why should we not form a picture of the ideal life, built out of abundant information, non-hierarchical work and the dissociation of work from wages?</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Millions of people are beginning to realise they have been sold a dream at odds with what reality can deliver. Their response is anger &ndash; and retreat towards national forms of capitalism that can only tear the world apart. Watching these emerge, from the pro-Grexit left factions in Syriza to the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/marine-le-pen" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">Front National</a>&nbsp;and the isolationism of the American right has been like watching the nightmares we had during the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/lehmanbrothers" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">Lehman Brothers</a>&nbsp;crisis come true.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">We need more than just a bunch of utopian dreams and small-scale horizontal projects. We need a project based on reason, evidence and testable designs, that cuts with the grain of history and is sustainable by the planet. And we need to get on with it.</p><ul style="margin-top: 0.8em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">
	<li style="margin-bottom: 0.8em;"><em>Postcapitalism&nbsp;</em>is published by Allen Lane on 30 July. Paul Mason will be asking whether capitalism has had its day at a sold-out Guardian Live event on 22 July. Let us know your thoughts beforehand at&nbsp;<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/membership" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">theguardian.com/membership</a>.</li>
</ul><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">Postcapitalism by Paul Mason (Allen Lane, &pound;16.99). To order a copy for &pound;12.99, go to&nbsp;<a href="https://bookshop.theguardian.com/catalog/product/view/id/316569/?utm_source=editoriallink&amp;utm_medium=merch&amp;utm_campaign=article" style="color: rgb(0, 86, 137); cursor: pointer; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220);">bookshop.theguardian.com</a>&nbsp;or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&amp;p over &pound;10, online orders only. Phone orders min. p&amp;p of &pound;1.99.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jul/17/postcapitalism-end-of-capitalism-begun#img-4"><strong>The Guardian</strong></a>&nbsp;</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; text-align: center;"><a href="https://contribute.theguardian.com/?REFPVID=j2wh9sh303s2g7od5blu&amp;INTCMP=gdnwb_copts_memco_kr1_epic_ask_four_earning_control"><img alt="Donate to Truth in Media" height="61" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1870/master/" width="313"></a></p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">&nbsp;</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">&nbsp;</p><p style="margin-bottom: 1rem; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;">&nbsp;</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1rem; padding: 0px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">&nbsp;</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1rem; padding: 0px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">&nbsp;</p>]]></description>
	<dc:creator>i Witness NEWS</dc:creator>
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	<guid isPermaLink="true">https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1784/the-thinking-process</guid>
	<pubDate>Sat, 15 Apr 2017 15:45:06 -0400</pubDate>
	<link>https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1784/the-thinking-process</link>
	<title><![CDATA[The Thinking Process]]></title>
	<description><![CDATA[<div><div><img alt="" height="24" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1812/master/" width="700"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #0000FF;"><span style="font-size: 24px;"><strong>The Thinking Process ~</strong></span></span></div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="24" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1812/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div><div><img alt="" height="525" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/345/14e120f739dd19701226cbeb32bb1f64/png" width="700"></div><div>&nbsp;</div></div><div><div>It seems that the process of Thinking is up to us, but we have the Spark of God (Mystery Monitor/Adjuster) and the Angels that spiritualize, improve, modify, and adjust our direction of thinking to eternalize it. We have the last say, the final word in how we go about our lives, but we have much help in how we make up that mind. In the end we personally take the action, make the decision and reap the rewards, one way or the other.</div></div><div><div>&nbsp;</div></div><div><div>Just thinking about this gives me pause to be patient in the process of making decisions and taking actions in my life.</div></div><div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" width="700"></div></div><div><div><strong><span style="color: #0000CD;"><span style="font-size: 10px;">110:2.3 (1205.1) Urantia Book</span></span></strong></div></div><div><div>The&nbsp;Adjuster&nbsp;is&nbsp;not&nbsp;trying&nbsp;to&nbsp;control&nbsp;your&nbsp;thinking,&nbsp;as&nbsp;such,&nbsp;but&nbsp;rather&nbsp;to&nbsp;spiritualize&nbsp;it,&nbsp;to&nbsp;eternalize&nbsp;it.&nbsp;Neither&nbsp;</div><div>angels&nbsp;nor&nbsp;Adjusters&nbsp;are&nbsp;devoted&nbsp;directly&nbsp;to&nbsp;influencing&nbsp;human&nbsp;thought;&nbsp;that&nbsp;is&nbsp;your&nbsp;exclusive&nbsp;personality&nbsp;</div><div>prerogative.&nbsp;The&nbsp;Adjusters&nbsp;are&nbsp;dedicated&nbsp;to&nbsp;improving,&nbsp;modifying,&nbsp;adjusting,&nbsp;and&nbsp;coordinating&nbsp;your&nbsp;thinking&nbsp;</div><div>processes;&nbsp;but&nbsp;more&nbsp;especially&nbsp;and&nbsp;specifically&nbsp;they&nbsp;are&nbsp;devoted&nbsp;to&nbsp;the&nbsp;work&nbsp;of&nbsp;building&nbsp;up&nbsp;spiritual&nbsp;counterparts&nbsp;of&nbsp;your&nbsp;careers,&nbsp;morontia&nbsp;transcripts&nbsp;of&nbsp;your&nbsp;true&nbsp;advancing&nbsp;selves,&nbsp;for&nbsp;survival&nbsp;purposes.</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><img alt="" height="8" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/1612/master/" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></div></div><p>&nbsp;</p>]]></description>
	<dc:creator>Bill Bricker</dc:creator>
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	<guid isPermaLink="true">https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1773/the-path-to-total-dictatorship-america%E2%80%99s-shadow-government-its-silent-coup</guid>
	<pubDate>Fri, 14 Apr 2017 00:33:54 -0400</pubDate>
	<link>https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1773/the-path-to-total-dictatorship-america%E2%80%99s-shadow-government-its-silent-coup</link>
	<title><![CDATA[The Path to Total Dictatorship: America’s Shadow Government &amp; Its Silent Coup]]></title>
	<description><![CDATA[<p>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkC8FaQ6b8s&amp;feature=youtu.be</p><div id="watch-uploader-info" style="font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-weight: 500; font-size: 13px; vertical-align: middle;">Published on Apr 4, 2017</span></div><div id="watch-description-text" style="font-size: 13px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;"><p id="eow-description" style="font-size: 13px;">Say hello to America&rsquo;s shadow government: a corporatized, militarized, entrenched bureaucracy that is fully operational and staffed by unelected officials who are, in essence, running the country. This shadow government represents the hidden face of a government that has no respect for the freedom of American citizens. No matter who sits in the White House or who allegedly represents us in Congress, this shadow government is here to stay. Indeed, as leaked documents by the FBI reveal, this shadow government&mdash;also referred to as &ldquo;The 7th Floor Group&rdquo;&mdash;essentially runs the government out of Washington DC. And as the Wikileaks data concerning the CIA&rsquo;s tapping into all of our electronic devices reveals, everything we&rsquo;re doing is being watched by government eyes.</p></div>]]></description>
	<dc:creator>i Witness NEWS</dc:creator>
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	<guid isPermaLink="true">https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1754/the-perfect-balance</guid>
	<pubDate>Thu, 13 Apr 2017 15:33:01 -0400</pubDate>
	<link>https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1754/the-perfect-balance</link>
	<title><![CDATA[The Perfect Balance]]></title>
	<description><![CDATA[<div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #000080;"><span style="font-size: 28px;">The Perfect Balance ~</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="36" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/Bars/Bar-arch-01.png" width="560"></div><div style="text-align: center;">&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #000080;"><span style="font-size: 28px;"><img alt="" height="800" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/Sketch73192857.png" width="1280"></span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #000080;"><span style="font-size: 28px;"><img alt="" height="111" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/Bars/Bar-00-break-c.png" width="1000"></span></span></div><div>&nbsp;</div></div><div><div><img alt="" height="150" src="https://spiritualfamily.net/photos/thumbnail/6877/master/" style="float: left;" width="150"></div><div>Jesus was the perfect balance in a human personality. He was all the things many of us aspire to be when we aim at that perfection in life&#39;s doings. A perfectly unified personality, and the perfect example of how each of us can become more and more balanced in our own lives.</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="111" src="https://spiritualfamily.net/images/Bars/Bar-00-break-c.png" width="1000"></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div><img alt="" height="100" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/Sketch5120305.png" style="float: left;" width="100"><span style="color: #696969;"><span style="font-size: 8px;">100:7.4 </span></span><span style="color: #0000CD;"><strong>Urantia Book</strong></span></div></div><div><div><span style="color: #0099ff;">~ The Son of Man was always a well-poised personality. Even his enemies maintained a wholesome respect for him; they even feared his presence. Jesus was unafraid. He was surcharged&nbsp;with divine enthusiasm, but he never became fanatical. He was emotionally active but never flighty. He was imaginative but always practical. He frankly faced the realities of life, but he was never dull or prosaic. He was courageous but never reckless; prudent but never cowardly. He was sympathetic but not sentimental; unique but not eccentric. He was pious but not sanctimonious. And he was so well-poised because he was so perfectly unified.&nbsp;</span></div><div>&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="50" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/Bars/Bar-04-Gold-600px.png" width="600"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="296" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/ckeditor/image/36/b872fc8df3c1f16918716d2c6f2d1e6f/png" width="388"></div><div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="111" src="https://spiritualfamily.net/images/Bars/Bar-00-break-c.png" width="1000"></div></div>]]></description>
	<dc:creator>Bill Bricker</dc:creator>
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	<guid isPermaLink="true">https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1712/power-and-freedom</guid>
	<pubDate>Thu, 06 Apr 2017 14:39:39 -0400</pubDate>
	<link>https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1712/power-and-freedom</link>
	<title><![CDATA[Power and Freedom]]></title>
	<description><![CDATA[<div><div style="text-align: center;"><strong><span style="color: #000080;"><span style="font-size: 28px;">Power and Freedom</span></span></strong> ~</div><div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="78" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/Bars/Bar-00-break-c.png" width="700"></div></div><div><div>Privilege is won by those with self-control. Liberty without license is born in those who have mastered their own selfish desires. Freedom born of Power is only for those who have stripped themselves of their self-pride, and steadfastly refuse to use that power for their own self-enhancement. These freedoms born of personal self-control and unselfish desires foster a strong and peaceful civilization.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="113" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/Bars/Bar-02-Thick-Shadow.png" width="569"></div><div>Morontia Mota ~ #6</div></div><div><div>
<p>To enjoy privilege without abuse, to have liberty without license, to possess power and steadfastly refuse to use it for self-aggrandizement &mdash; these are the marks of high civilization.</p>
<div>Urantia Book (556.8) 48:7.8 6</div><div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" height="1120" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/Sketch280112753.png" width="700"></div></div></div>]]></description>
	<dc:creator>Bill Bricker</dc:creator>
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	<guid isPermaLink="true">https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1670/et-news-of-the-prayer-life-on-other-worlds-of-space</guid>
	<pubDate>Mon, 03 Apr 2017 09:27:11 -0400</pubDate>
	<link>https://spiritualfamily.net/blog/view/1670/et-news-of-the-prayer-life-on-other-worlds-of-space</link>
	<title><![CDATA[ET News of the Prayer Life on Other Worlds of Space]]></title>
	<description><![CDATA[<p><img alt="" height="288" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/Profile-ET-News-00.gif" width="990"></p><p><span style="font-size: 20px;"><span style="color: #0000FF;">We Are Not Alone in the Universe ● Their are 619 Inhabited Worlds in our System of worlds ● The Master Universe is filled with inhabited whirling world&#39;s of space</span></span></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: normal; font-size: 21.6px; color: rgb(68, 68, 68);">ET News of the Prayer Life on Other Worlds of Space</span></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">One can achieve a real understanding of the nature and character of a created being with human will dignity by studying the prayer life of that being.</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">God provides for the sovereign choice of all true personalities. No personal creature can be coerced into the eternal adventure; the portal of eternity opens only in response to the freewill choice of the freewill sons of the God of free will.</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><br />
True liberty in the association of all created beings must be restrained by love, motivated by loyalty, and directed by the intelligent discipline of wisdom. As long as we teach the universe child to pray, &ldquo;Our Father who is in heaven,&rdquo; a tremendous responsibility rests upon all earthly fathers and father&rsquo;s from other world&rsquo;s of space so to live and order their homes that the word father becomes worthily enshrined in the minds and hearts of all growing children.<br />
We begin our study of Extraterrestrial Beings with a study of the prayers of these beings from other of the whirling world&rsquo;s of space.</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><br />
What do these supplications in the prayer life on other worlds reveal about the spiritual insights and true motives of these children of the whirling worlds of space.<br />
&nbsp;<br />
First on the list is the prayer given to this world by our Creator 2,000 years ago, whom many on this world will recognize.&nbsp;</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">&nbsp;</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><img alt="" height="30" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/AniBar-GoldGlobe-02.gif" style="font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">Our Father who is in heaven,<br />
Hallowed be your name.<br />
Your kingdom come; your will be done<br />
On earth as it is in heaven.<br />
Give us this day our bread for tomorrow;<br />
Refresh our souls with the water of life.<br />
And forgive us every one our debts<br />
As we also have forgiven our debtors.<br />
Save us in temptation, deliver us from evil,<br />
And increasingly make us perfect like yourself.</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">&nbsp;</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><img alt="" height="30" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/AniBar-GoldGlobe-02.gif" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">From time to time, during the remainder of Jesus&rsquo; sojourn on earth, he brought to the notice of the apostles several additional forms of prayer, but he did this only in illustration of other matters, and he enjoined that these &ldquo;parable prayers&rdquo; should not be taught to the multitudes. Many of them were from other inhabited planets, but this fact Jesus did not reveal to the twelve. Among these prayers were the following:</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">&nbsp;</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><img alt="" height="30" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/AniBar-GoldGlobe-02.gif" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">&nbsp;</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">Our Father in whom consist the universe realms,<br />
Uplifted be your name and all-glorious your character.<br />
Your presence encompasses us, and your glory is manifested<br />
Imperfectly through us as it is in perfection shown on high.<br />
Give us this day the vivifying forces of light,<br />
And let us not stray into the evil bypaths of our imagination,<br />
For yours is the glorious indwelling, the everlasting power,<br />
And to us, the eternal gift of the infinite love of your Son.<br />
Even so, and everlastingly true.</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><br />
&nbsp;<img alt="" height="30" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/AniBar-GoldGlobe-02.gif" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">Our creative Parent, who is in the center of the universe,<br />
Bestow upon us your nature and give to us your character.<br />
Make us sons and daughters of yours by grace<br />
And glorify your name through our eternal achievement.<br />
Your adjusting and controlling spirit give to live and dwell within us<br />
That we may do your will on this sphere as angels do your bidding in light.<br />
Sustain us this day in our progress along the path of truth.<br />
Deliver us from inertia, evil, and all sinful transgression.<br />
Be patient with us as we show loving-kindness to our fellows.<br />
Shed abroad the spirit of your mercy in our creature hearts.<br />
Lead us by your own hand, step by step, through the uncertain maze of life,<br />
And when our end shall come, receive into your own bosom our faithful spirits.<br />
Even so, not our desires but your will be done.<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><img alt="" height="30" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/AniBar-GoldGlobe-02.gif" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">Our perfect and righteous heavenly Father,<br />
This day guide and direct our journey.<br />
Sanctify our steps and co-ordinate our thoughts.<br />
Ever lead us in the ways of eternal progress.<br />
Fill us with wisdom to the fullness of power<br />
And vitalize us with your infinite energy.<br />
Inspire us with the divine consciousness of<br />
The presence and guidance of the seraphic hosts.<br />
Guide us ever upward in the pathway of light;<br />
Justify us fully in the day of the great judgment.<br />
Make us like yourself in eternal glory<br />
And receive us into your endless service on high.</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><img alt="" height="30" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/AniBar-GoldGlobe-02.gif" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">Our Father who is in the mystery,<br />
Reveal to us your holy character.<br />
Give your children on earth this day<br />
To see the way, the light, and the truth.<br />
Show us the pathway of eternal progress<br />
And give us the will to walk therein.<br />
Establish within us your divine kingship<br />
And thereby bestow upon us the full mastery of self.<br />
Let us not stray into paths of darkness and death;<br />
Lead us everlastingly beside the waters of life.<br />
Hear these our prayers for your own sake;<br />
Be pleased to make us more and more like yourself.<br />
At the end, for the sake of the divine Son,<br />
Receive us into the eternal arms.<br />
Even so, not our will but yours be done.</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><img alt="" height="30" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/AniBar-GoldGlobe-02.gif" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">Glorious Father and Mother, in one parent combined,<br />
Loyal would we be to your divine nature.<br />
Your own self to live again in and through us<br />
By the gift and bestowal of your divine spirit,<br />
Thus reproducing you imperfectly in this sphere<br />
As you are perfectly and majestically shown on high.<br />
Give us day by day your sweet ministry of brotherhood<br />
And lead us moment by moment in the pathway of loving service.<br />
Be you ever and unfailingly patient with us<br />
Even as we show forth your patience to our children.<br />
Give us the divine wisdom that does all things well<br />
And the infinite love that is gracious to every creature.<br />
Bestow upon us your patience and loving-kindness<br />
That our charity may enfold the weak of the realm.<br />
And when our career is finished, make it an honor to your name,<br />
A pleasure to your good spirit, and a satisfaction to our soul helpers.<br />
Not as we wish, our loving Father, but as you desire the eternal good of your mortal children,<br />
Even so may it be.</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><img alt="" height="30" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/AniBar-GoldGlobe-02.gif" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">Our all-faithful Source and all-powerful Center,<br />
Reverent and holy be the name of your all-gracious Son.<br />
Your bounties and your blessings have descended upon us,<br />
Thus empowering us to perform your will and execute your bidding.<br />
Give us moment by moment the sustenance of the tree of life;<br />
Refresh us day by day with the living waters of the river thereof.<br />
Step by step lead us out of darkness and into the divine light.<br />
Renew our minds by the transformations of the indwelling spirit,<br />
And when the mortal end shall finally come upon us,<br />
Receive us to yourself and send us forth in eternity.<br />
Crown us with celestial diadems of fruitful service,<br />
And we shall glorify the Father, the Son, and the Holy Influence.<br />
Even so, throughout a universe without end.</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><img alt="" height="30" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/AniBar-GoldGlobe-02.gif" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">Our Father who dwells in the secret places of the universe,<br />
Honored be your name, reverenced your mercy, and respected your judgment.<br />
Let the sun of righteousness shine upon us at noontime,<br />
While we beseech you to guide our wayward steps in the twilight.<br />
Lead us by the hand in the ways of your own choosing<br />
And forsake us not when the path is hard and the hours are dark.<br />
Forget us not as we so often neglect and forget you.<br />
But be you merciful and love us as we desire to love you.<br />
Look down upon us in kindness and forgive us in mercy<br />
As we in justice forgive those who distress and injure us.<br />
May the love, devotion, and bestowal of the majestic Son<br />
Make available life everlasting with your endless mercy and love.<br />
May the God of universes bestow upon us the full measure of his spirit;<br />
Give us grace to yield to the leading of this spirit.<br />
By the loving ministry of devoted seraphic hosts<br />
May the Son guide and lead us to the end of the age.<br />
Make us ever and increasingly like yourself<br />
And at our end receive us into the eternal Paradise embrace.<br />
Even so, in the name of the bestowal Son<br />
And for the honor and glory of the Supreme Father.</p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);"><img alt="" height="30" src="http://spiritualfamily.net/images/AniBar-GoldGlobe-02.gif" style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px;" width="700"></p><p style="font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 14.4px; background-color: rgb(237, 240, 245);">Though the apostles were not at liberty to present these prayer lessons in their public teachings, they profited much from all of these revelations in their personal religious experiences. Jesus utilized these and other prayer models as illustrations in connection with the intimate instruction of the twelve, and s</p><p>&nbsp;</p>]]></description>
	<dc:creator>ET NEWS</dc:creator>
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