I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, but the sympathetic vibrations would set in a harmonic resonance in the tectonic plates, leading to tidal waves, earthquakes and volcano eruption. The cacaphony of noise would cause the entire world to vibrate and shake until the fabric of space-time itself was warped and distended and when the smoke finally cleared there would be a dusty blur where the earth used to be. The hole in the gravity matrix of the solar system would pull Mars and Venus towards each other, only to be split apart by the wildly wheeling antics of the Earth's baby, Luna. Things would never be the same. Which might be a good thing.

The American dream used to be to leave an oppressed life, come to America and then, regardless of background, if you worked hard and dealt with people fair and square, you could be successful. The New American dream is to obtain as much wealth as possible by doing the least amount of work, to crush as many people as possible along the way and never have to pay for the harm you do to others. Like the gorilla in the living room, few people in power to change this situation are willing to mention or combat this new emerging American culture of sheer greed and pyschotic behavior. If you scrape away the protestations and pull the veil of denial away from your eyes, if you look at the trends and the patterns this is what you see. America the latest Fascist state, out of control and led by sociopaths and psychotics. Greed is the pasword and the masses demand more blood on the entertainment boxes, more sex in the 'newspapers' and more money to be won simply by guessing four numbers in a row... but even the guessing is too much work, so we cheer even louder when someone wins by selecting 'random' for their guess.

No, it's not an angry old man complaining that things have changed and 'it's not like when I was a boy!' although it certainly is not. But like most Aries personalities, I enjoy a good logic puzzle. You strip away the emotional baggage, you remove the symbolism, and you deal with the bricks in the wall, then step back from the wall and see what has happened. And what has happened is this: there is no more to the American dream, there is only the old dreams of despots and fools that led to the Crusades, the Burning Times, the Sea to Shining Sea Genocides. We're looking for more place to burn and more people to kill. It makes us feel powerful when the rest of the world appears to be getting more powerful than us. Like an old dog snapping at the local curs we send in our troops to kill, torture and rape and to spread fear and hatred. It's an Old Testament America.

We have a President who honestly and openly says God (Yaweh) sent him to "bring democracy to the Middle East and peace to the world". But of course, as a Republican the President has a different idea of democracy. It's not his fault per se at this time, he never did well in school and history was never his best subject. He has confused 'capitalism' for 'democracy' and his version of peace is when all our enemies are dead or subjugated... just like Joshua being sent out by God to burn the cities, rape the women, kill the men and sell the children. You can't mind the bits of reality like the number of American dead, or the tens of thousands uncounted non-American dead when God has told you that you will bring this peace to the world. The sad thing is that as in all the other similar declines of great nations, the citizens of this nation refuse to read the patterns.

The way it works is in fact a trickle down. The psychotic President and sociopathic ministers and advisors set up the conditions that encourage people to value greed over generosity, violence over discussion. We have a national policy of pre-emptive nuclear strikes on nations which we suspect of thinking about possibly attacking us sometime in the future. We have laws in the President's home state of Texas which allows people to travel with concealed wepons. His brother has signed laws which allow one to kill another if you sincerely believe that at some point they may attack you. This will make you safer. I suspect George was attacked by his brother when he was younger and has never been able to trust anyone since, except perhaps his girlfriend, Condi, and his advisors keep them apart as much as possible so as to avoid the pictures in the tabloids of them walking in the Rose Garden holding hands and sitting face to face under the rudy moon. Cheating and lying got him to the top. Killing and raping and torture are acceptable to him. Truth is something you create to allow the things you want to happen, to create the proper atmosphere for your plans. Thus we are set up for the greatest meltdown of a nation since the Roman Empire.

The good news is that the world is round and money is an easily burned piece of paper with numbers written on it. We don't have to allow this. This bastardization of the Great Experiment could be stopped by people simply refusing to listen, by refusing to use money, by shrinking down their interests to their families and their friends. If everyone agreed that this crazy set of people cannot be trusted and are not safe to be around, the government of this nation would be powerless to hurt the world. If people refused to kill other people, if they refused to buy lottery tickets, if they refused to speak badly of others, or to covet their spouses or lovers. If we refused to get concerned over who kissed whom, or what some actress did on the beach, we would be free of those invisible chains this nightmarish administration has shackled us with.

But to do this we must be strong and no adict is strong. No stoned out, drunken stumbling bum ever stood up on the street corner and said "God is Love, we must no kill or harm our sisters and brothers!". It takes a sober mind to consider turning away from drink. No abusive husband ever stopped in mid swing and thought, "This is unfair and hurtful, I should stop now."

So if history is any guide.... and it surely is... this nation is about to crumble or evolve or both. The evolution of a democracy into a republic, into a despotic war machine is recorded a thousand times in history and the good news is that some of the farmers get away with some of their herds and seeds. Young people are strong enough to swim the river under machine gun fire to the shores of freedom and the potential of democracy. We just have to make it to the river.

In the meantime the roof does not leak into my bedroom, the new kitten does not appear to have cancer and no one died over the last few weeks whose name I know. Greedy for good news, I report a bit of the continued friendly advances of the new kitten. She rubs against my leg and only runs a few feet when I try to pet her. She no longer hides for days, coming out at night to raid her food dish. She has emerged from her dark times to a new life of love and warmth.

This can be taken as a symbol, like Persephone emerging from her dark times into the light. I haven't hit the bottom yet, and my family and I are well protected from much of the turmoil in the world. We are no immediate threat to anyone, so I guess the Others will leave us alone, and if we can pay back the bills, keep the house from buring up and be healthy, we can navigate the stream and find our way to something less offensive. Magicians and witches are seting up rituals to heal the psychic shell around the earth and are full of piss and vinegar and shit. The problem with their rituals is that they have mistaken symbols for facts. The rituals of Magick are supposed to be for curing individuals, especially the Magicians themselves. I was recently asked to join such a Circle, to participate in the gathering of power and help heal the psychic wound people like Rumsfeld and Cheney have inflicted on us. But in the middle of the letter was a caveat. "The price for this is $85"

Well.

Trickle down is pervasive. If Magical Circles now charge the participants to heal the earth from greed and obsession with money, then the only people capable of actually creating such a ritual are the solitary workers of magic, the shamans and sorcerors, and typically they don't involve themselves in such work, knowing that the tectonics of culture asure us of success if we simply take into the formula the fact that we are all of us mortal and eventually we all become peaceful as dust. Nations eventually get sucked down below the mantle and become silica, carbon and energy. Patience is the best spell, as it requires little risk and affirms the basic tenent of modern Magick: "an it hurt none, do what you will". So you must be sure of harming none.

Jainism may be the best way out for Amerika.

Jesus and his brother James and their cousin John were working the lines at the local soup kitchen. Jesus talked to the people at the tables, inquiring about their situations and familes and John followed, taking notes and giving them cards with addresses of safe houses and nearby clinics. James was in the kitchen fixing up fish soup with lots of garlic and dill and plenty of warm grains. Mary Magdelene was in the back room counselling young women and handing out condoms. There was not a priest nor rabbi to be seen, other than the brothers, and they were too busy to preach. There was work to be done.

Mary and Jesus sometimes ate together at the tables, along with their children. They all slept at the shelter, having no home, no car, no bank account. Jesus worked bagging groceries or mowing lawns or shovelling sidewalks and Mary gave out herbal remedies to those sick patrons with no funds for doctors. None of her patients had to visit the ER late at night, Mary was always ready to help. More than once the kids slept on the floor while some sick lady of the night hid in their beds while Mary tended her wounds and John and James visited her pimp to work out a deal to free her. Sometimes they were rebuffed, but mostly the people on the street knew that it was better overall to go along with the strange bunch of hippies who lived in the darkest part of town.

The two kids, Adam and Moses, sometimes played Old Maid with me in a back corner. By candlelight we played, sipping our glasses of diluted wine and muching on day old bread. Moses never cheated but often had more cards than the deck and we had to start over. I asked him how in the world did he get all those cards? "Beats me!" he grinned, and I ruffled his hair and said, "Well, be more careful. You have to discard each turn!" But it was hard to be angry under his glowing smile. Adam slipped off the chair to get more wine for us from Mary, who was sitting at the desk talking on the phone to a troubled neighbor. She absentmindly stroked her son's dark hair while he waited to ask for the wine. When the call was completed another crisis was over and she handed the bottle and the corkscrew to the child and closed her eyes and sighed. Jesus was there, holding her hand and gazing at her face. He never grew tired of watching her. All these years she never strayed far from his side, no matter where he went or how tough it got she remained his and only his. Most of the Lady's women were more open in their giving, more generous with their love, but Mary had made a choice years ago to stay with this serious young man who cared so much for those in need. The Lady had plenty of servants and there were no rules to break, no Papal Bulls to jump. Life was good for them here. In the corner I once again counted the cards in Moses's hand and sighed in disbelief. "Twenty-seven cards is way too many.... you know this!" But the laughter and the bright eyes made me smile and start over. Mary and Jesus had left the room. I could see the moon rising over the abandoned factory across the street.