(from wikipedia.com)
The Bee Gees' career record sales total more than 220 million ranking them among the best-selling music artists of all time. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997; the presenter of the award to "Britain's first family of harmony" was Brian Wilson, historical leader of the Beach Boys, a "family act" also featuring three harmonising brothers. The Bee Gees' Hall of Fame citation says "Only Elvis Presley, The Beatles, Michael Jackson, Garth Brooks and Paul McCartney have outsold the Bee Gees."
(from www.MoveToAmend.org)
When it comes to constitutions, the application of law, and common sense, the Supreme Court of the United States could learn a thing or two from President Judge Debbie O’Dell-Seneca of the Washington County Court of Common Pleas in Pennsylvania.
O’Dell-Seneca overruled a previous decision that sealed a settlement between a Mount Pleasant Township family and large energy corporations, which caused the family harm because of fracking on an adjacent property to their own. The Observer-Reporter and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette pressed the suit, which ultimately decided the public’s right to be informed outstripped the corporation’s right to privacy.
In fact, O’Dell-Seneca went much further than that. The judge asserted corporations have no constitutional rights:
“...the constitution vests in business entities no special rights that the laws of this Commonwealth cannot extinguish. In sum, [corporations] cannot assert [constitutional privacy] protections because they are not mentioned in its text.”
“...it is axiomatic that corporations, companies, and partnerships have no ‘spiritual nature,’ ‘feelings,’ ‘intellect,’ ‘beliefs,’ ‘thoughts,’ ‘emotions,’ or ‘sensations,’ because they do not exist in the manner that humankind exists… They cannot be ‘let alone’ by government, because businesses are but grapes, ripe upon the vine of the law, that the people of this Commonwealth raise, tend, and prune at their pleasure and need.”
Despite the mainstream media’s blackout on any reporting that calls into question corporate personhood, this recent decision is an important victory for our movement.
CELDF (Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund) Executive Director Thomas Linzey writes: “The ruling represents the first crack in the judicial armor that has been so meticulously welded together by major corporations. And it affirms what many communities already know -- that change only occurs when people begin to openly question and challenge legal doctrines that have been treated as sacred by most lawyers and judges.”
Laws follow culture and the legal system adjusts as society's views shift. This case illustrates that we are collectively beginning to change hearts and minds about the appropriate role of the corporation in society, even amongst those who are entrenched in the current system.
I think sometimes, probably more so during the year-end holiday season (Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years for all of the 'religiously-persecuted') that we as a species have arrived at a particularly crucial point in our development.
On the one hand, the more educated and sophisticated we become, the greater our preoccupation with our self-realization. As this takes place, we find ourselves less involved with the intricacies of our extended families. In fact, sometimes we find that while we love the members of our extended family we don't, in truth, like them as much as other, more-similarly (within the realms of intellectual, artistic, political, and humanitarian areas) disposed people.
So as we attain greater freedom, movement, awareness and development, we lose the commitment, duty, obligation to care for our family members who, in tribal times long gone, we would have spent our entire lives with- day in and day out.
I don't know what or where the happy medium between these two extremes exists. I most certainly understand and appreciate the value of existence at both ends of this spectrum.
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. . . or related topics with your family. I think, and hope, that although I ventured into that dangerous turf, I may have survived this ordeal 'relatively' unscathed. And I hope that I perceive correctly because I sincerely respect their points of view, although I am still entitled to my own and chose to defend it to the point where my loved one expressed some visible discomfort with the boisterous debate that ensued; even though she thoroughly agrees with me.
I don't understand why some of the 99% do not even realize that they fall precisely within that percentage.
Further. . .the significance of the Occupy movements could eventually rival the impact of the civil rights movement. Not only are many confused members of the 99% missing, priests, pastors and clergy of every kind are conspicuously absent.
The evils that sparked these protests are real and critical to the well-being of lots of people. Instead of feeling proud of giving turkeys to the poor, religious and non-religious alike should be joining in the protests against the haughty rich.
". . . The current crop of national bank leaders are being shown to be just as corrupt as were the temple bankers of Jesus day. If Jesus were present among us today, he would be moving from Portland, to Los Angeles to Kansas City, to Dallas, up to Chicago and on to Wall Street in New York City. He would join the protest in every city. . ." (from Howard Bess)
Above inspired by writings of Howard Bess [The Rev. Howard Bess is a retired American Baptist minister, who lives in Palmer, Alaska. His email address is HYPERLINK "mailto:hdbss@mtaonline.net" hdbss@mtaonline.net]
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A while back, a widely broadcast public service announcement and slogan of the United Negro College fund included the line, ". . . because a mind is a terrible thing to waste."
To be sure, it was and is most certainly true.
But in addition, we, as homosapiens, seem to waste a lot of things. No, this isn't going to be a rant about conservation, nature or the environment. This thought came home to me thinking about my extended family. My wife and I half-jokingly say things like "you're so close" when names of my extended family members arise, mainly because her family always made it a point to STAY CLOSE. After all, they were FAMILY! My family on the other hand, drifted apart, not because of squabbles, disagreements or fights, but simply due to neglect. Maybe neglect is the wrong word. Apathy? Preoccupation?
Whatever the appropriate word may be, WE DID IT. And now as the years progress, MOST of the older generation is now gone and the remaining 'cousins' have only been in contact at funerals. Very sad indeed.
My hope, as a result, it to (possibly) initiate and maintain some semblance of contact. (I hope.) With this remarkable technology that should be fairly simple, shouldn't it? Well, we'll see. Stay tuned.
