Allen L Roland's Radio Weblog

HEALTH CARE REFORM BILL / THE BIG PICTURE

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 17:57:48 GMT

HEALTH CARE REFORM BILL / THE BIG PICTURE

The corporate oligarchy has full control of the Health Care Bill before Congress to the extent that Goldman Sachs has been counseling the Insurance Industry against any meaningful reform. Sound familiar ? Of course, the Health Care reform Bill is another Wall Street bailout with Main Street footing the bill and ultimately paying the consequences: Allen L Roland

H.R.3962 ( The Affordable Health Care For Americans Act ) should be retitled ( Greater Health Care Insurance Profits Act ) for that is the true essence of Obamacare.

As Dennis Kucinich said ~ " In H.R. 3962, the government is requiring at least 21 million Americans to buy private health insurance from the very industry that causes costs to be so high, which will result in at least $70 billion in new annual revenue, much of which is coming from taxpayers .... Meanwhile, The “robust public option” which would have offered a modicum of competition to a monopolistic industry was whittled down from an initial potential enrollment of 129 million Americans to 6 million. "

You are literally hearing the same words today regarding the Insurance Industry as were said regarding the Banking Industry last November ~ " We can't afford to let them fail and a strong public option would put many of them out of business so let's go through the motions, pass a harmless bill, with little if any public option, and keep our corporate masters happy."

If socialism is about the state running things on behalf of the public ~ then fascism is about the state running things on behalf of corporations and that is precisely where we are in our present day Oligarchy ( Government ruled by the powerful few ~ mainly Wall Street Corporations )

Here's proof ~ from the American Progress Report of November 13th / UNDER THE RADAR http://pr.thinkprogress.org/2009/11/pr20091113

HEALTH CARE / GOLDMAN SACHS COUNSELS INSURANCE INDUSTRY AGAINST ANY REFORM: " In an analysis compiled in mid-October, Goldman Sachs concluded that the current legislative language in any of the five reform plans that were then under consideration would lower the overall value of insurance company stocks. The analysis -- which included the stocks of AETNA, Cigna, UnitedHealth, WellPoint, and Humana -- determined that doing nothing at all was clearly the best route for private health insurance companies. If there must be reform, however, the analysis stated that a "watered-down version of the Senate Finance Committee's bill" ~ which would require corrective "changes prior to major implementation" ~ would be second best. The analysis determined that under the Senate Finance Committee's bill, which lacks a public option, the private insurers would fair the best, with their earnings per share growing "an estimated five percent from 2010 through 2019." When the bill passed the Senate Finance Committee in September, the stock prices of these five mega-insurers spiked as much as 3 percent in just a few hours. Legislation that resembles what was passed by the House last weekend is referred to as the "bear case" scenario in the analysis and would likely mean "earnings per share for the top five insurers would decline an estimated one percent from 2010 through 2019." If the insurance industry successfully kills any legislation, Goldman declared that "earnings per share would grow an estimated ten percent from 2010 through 2019, and the value of the stock would rise an estimated 59 percent during that time period." Goldman's analysis "calculates the probability of reform passing Congress at 75 percent."

Over 70% of Americans rightly feel their House representatives are more responsive to Washington lobbyists than their own constituents ~ and they are absolutely correct ~ even to the extent of lobbyists writing health care argument scripts for House representatives. Robert Pear, NY Times, blows the whistle on November 13th as to who Congress really listens to; In House, Many Spoke With One Voice: Lobbyists’

Excerpt: " In the official record of the historic House debate on overhauling health care, the speeches of many lawmakers echo with similarities. Often, that was no accident. Statements by more than a dozen lawmakers were ghostwritten, in whole or in part, by Washington lobbyists working for Genentech, one of the world’s largest biotechnology companies. E-mail messages obtained by The New York Times show that the lobbyists drafted one statement for Democrats and another for Republicans... Members of Congress submit statements for publication in the Congressional Record all the time, often with a decorous request to “revise and extend my remarks.” It is unusual for so many revisions and extensions to match up word for word. It is even more unusual to find clear evidence that the statements originated with lobbyists." http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/15/us/politics/15health.html?_r=1

So there you have it, the Wall Street corporate oligarchy has full control of the Health Care Reform debate to the extent that they are not only counseling the Insurance Industry but they are also writing the script .

As Robert Reich ( Salon ) reports today ~ " Upbeat policy wonks and political spinners who tend to see only portions of cups that are full will point out some good things: no preexisting conditions, insurance exchanges, 30 million more Americans covered. But in reality, the cup is 90 percent empty. Most of us will remain stuck with little or no choice ~ dependent on private insurers who care only about the bottom line, who deny our claims, who charge us more and more for co-payments and deductibles, who bury us in forms, who don't take our calls." http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2009/11/19/public_option/index.html?source=newsletter

Under these circumstances, the only public option apparently left is to buy insurance or go directly to jail.

Allen L Roland http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/2009/11/20.html

Freelance Online columnist Allen L Roland is available for comments, interviews and speaking engagements ( allen@allenroland.com )

Allen L Roland is a practicing psychotherapist, author and lecturer who also shares a daily political and social commentary on his weblog and website allenroland.com He also guest hosts a monthly national radio show TRUTHTALK on www.conscioustalk.net

Allen Roland’s weblog: http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/
Website: www.allenroland.com
ONLY THE TRUTH IS REVOLUTIONARY

DEADLY PNEUMONIC PLAGUE-LIKE VIRUS STRANGLES UKRAINE

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 17:56:26 GMT

DEADLY PNEUMONIC PLAGUE-LIKE VIRUS STRANGLES UKRAINE

Tymoshenko, prime minister of Ukraine and a candidate in upcoming national elections, visits a children's hospital in western Ukraine ~ where a deadly virus has plunged the country and its neighbors into a state of panic.

A cocktail of three [Baxter] flu viruses are reported to have mutated into a deadly plague-like pneumonic virus, which may be far more dangerous than swine flu ~ and it appears to have strangled Western Ukraine and its neighbors in panic: Allen L Roland

This was bound to happen ~ the mutation of deadly viruses into a deadly plague-like pneumonic virus which directly attacks the lungs and results in their total destruction.

This is not a fear based epidemic ~ it's the real thing !

Ukraine President Yushchenko said: "People are dying. The epidemic is killing doctors. This is absolutely inconceivable in the 21st Century."

OFFICIAL NUMBERS of Sick Released 12th of November

1,253,558 SICK

65,615 HOSPITALIZED

239 DEAD

Greg Miskiw, World News, reported on November 15th " that more than 1 million people have been infected, most of them in the nine regions of Western Ukraine... Universities, schools and kindergartens have been closed, public meetings have been banned and theatres shut. Last week several border crossings in the country were also closed... Neighboring Poland has called on the EU to take action, fearing the mystery virus may spread westwards....Russia, Slovakia, Poland, Hungary and Romania, countries that border Ukraine, have already launched health checks on Ukrainians entering their territory. Slovakia has closed two of five border crossings. A doctor in Western Ukraine who did not want to be named, said:” We have carried out post mortems on two victims and found their lungs are as black as charcoal ~ they look like they have been burned. It’s terrifying.” http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/140492/Million-hit-by-plague-worse-than-swine-flu

Doctors have now learned why Ukrainians are dying so rapidly ~ all the victims died of viral distress syndrome ( the total destruction of the lungs ) MIGnews.com.ua picks up the sequence from there ~ " Cardio-pulmonary insufficiency comes and consequently cardiogenic shock develops, which causes cardiac standstill and death, said the bureau chief of the Chernivtsi regional forensic examination, doctor of science, Professor Viktor Bachynsky, UNIAN reports. "The virus, which causes death, is very aggressive, it does not strike the trachea, but immediately gets into the lungs and causes heavy swelling and solid hemorrhage. Mixed types of parainfluenza and influenza A/N1N1 lead to this state. This is a very toxic strain, which has not yet answered to the treatment of the Ministry of Health", said Viktor Bachinsky. http://www.mignews.com.ua/en/articles/378759.html

We must watch this rapidly developing story closely for in this deeply interconnected world where knowledge can immediately be accessed on the Internet ~ an unchecked pneumonic virus can not only shut down a country in a few days but most certainly, if left unchecked, could strangle Europe in a few weeks. The other unanswered question is Baxter Labs suspicious role in this new viral epidemic. Watch this five minute YouTube video ~ Baxter's Ukraine Pneumonic Plague Virus is a BIOWEAPON which leaves even more unanswered questions. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xlvfj-NOg0s

But any unanswered questions about BIOWEAPONS usually will lead to CHEMTRAILS ~ a theory that holds that some contrails are actually chemicals or biological agents deliberately sprayed at high altitudes for a purpose undisclosed to the general public. This is not a theory for the town of Oakville, Washington ~ see 8 minute video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8ETZG6Qj8w

Now there are reports that last week, (aircraft) sprayed (an unknown) substance over Ukraine days before the (mysterious) pneumonic plague like virus outbreak.

Allen L Roland http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/2009/11/18.html

Freelance Online columnist Allen L Roland is available for comments, interviews and speaking engagements ( allen@allenroland.com )

Allen L Roland is a practicing psychotherapist, author and lecturer who also shares a daily political and social commentary on his weblog and website allenroland.com He also guest hosts a monthly national radio show TRUTHTALK on www.conscioustalk.net

Allen Roland’s weblog: http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/
Website: www.allenroland.com
ONLY THE TRUTH IS REVOLUTIONARY

AFGHANISTAN / THE BIG PICTURE

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 18:10:20 GMT

AFGHANISTAN / THE BIG PICTURE

Afghanistan Opium Poppy farmer carrying assault weapon / Corbis

The big picture in Afghanistan is that we have no intention of leaving this illegally occupied country for two reasons; First, to restore and control the world's largest supply of Opium and Second, to build a permanent US military strike force with a series of permanent US airbases across Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda, in reality, does not exist as a threat in Afghanistan: Allen L Roland

While our song and dance man, President Obama, engages in his eight day photo Op visit in the Asian / Pacific region ~ he also continues his highly publicized dance steps regarding troop strength in Afghanistan ~ however, the decision has already been made and was made some time ago as to the importance of Afghanistan in terms of what the Pentagon calls 'America's Full Spectrum Dominance or the American Global Imperium'.

Secretary Of State Hillary Clinton let the cat out of the bag yesterday in her ABC interview with George Stephanopoulos ~ " Our primary focus is on the security of the United States of America. How do we protect and defend against future attacks. We do not want to see Afghanistan return to being a safe haven and a staging platform for terrorism as it was before. That is what is driving the President to make the best decision he can make."

In other words, We're not here to build a democracy, George ~ it's all about our long term security ~ we're staying and we will use the War on Terror as our excuse ~ we're got too much capital at stake here and we can't afford to be seen as weak with a mid-term election coming up next year.

By the way, The cost of sending 40,000 additional American troops to Afghanistan is estimated to be between $40 billion to $54 billion annually, a new report says. The New York Times cited top administration officials on Saturday that budget projections for the Afghan war will cost US taxpayers at least $1 million per soldier, per year.

It should be obvious that our illegal and morally corrupt occupation of Afghanistan can no longer be justified as the leading front of The War on Terror for the biggest corruption itself is not just the US installed Karsai puppet government ~ it's the occupation itself ! Growing evidence also strongly suggests that Mr. Karzai, and his brother, have enriched themselves greatly by helping the illegal trade in poppy and opium to flourish .

Robert Naiman, Just Foreign Policy, expounds on this very same point in his article Our Corrupt Occupation of Afghanistan ~ " But the biggest corruption of all is the occupation itself, because it is all based on a big lie: the claim that our continued occupation of Afghanistan is justified by the threat of an Al Qaeda "haven" in Afghanistan. This is a lie because: 1) as former counter-terrorism official Paul Pillar has pointed out, "the case has not been made" that "such a haven would significantly increase the terrorist danger to the United States" and 2) Mullah Mohammed Omar's "Quetta Shura" Taliban have been signaling for months that they are done with Al Qaeda and there has been no U.S. response. McChrystal wants reinforcements to go to Kandahar. That's Mullah Omar's home turf. If McChrystal is given troops to go to Kandahar, then it's not about Al Qaeda."

http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/node/403

So if it's not about Al Qaeda ~ what's it all about ? What's the big picture in Afghanistan ?

The truth is that it's still all about Global Imperialism and we have no intention of ever leaving Afghanistan !

On October 21, 2009 F. William Engdahl wrote a brilliant and insightful article ( Rense ) on The Geopolitics Behind The Phony US War In Afghanistan and explained the two principal reasons we will maintain our occupation of Afghanistan ~ " One of the most remarkable aspects of the Obama Presidential agenda is how little anyone has questioned in the media or elsewhere why at all the United States Pentagon is committed to a military occupation of Afghanistan. There are two basic reasons, neither one of which can be admitted openly to the public at large.... Behind all the deceptive official debate over how many troops are needed to "win" the war in Afghanistan, whether another 30,000 is sufficient, or whether at least 200,000 are needed, the real purpose of US military presence in that pivotal Central Asian country is obscured.... Even during the 2008 Presidential campaign candidate Obama argued that Afghanistan not Iraq was where the US must wage war. His reason? Because he claimed, that was where the Al Qaeda organization was holed up and that was the "real" threat to US national security.... However, the real reasons behind US involvement in Afghanistan is quite different .... The US military is in Afghanistan for two reasons. First to restore and control the world's largest supply of opium for the world heroin markets and to use the drugs as a geopolitical weapon against opponents, especially Russia. That control of the Afghan drug market is essential for the liquidity of the bankrupt and corrupt Wall Street financial mafia.... The second reason the US military remains in Afghanistan long after the world has forgotten even who the mysterious Osama bin Laden and his alleged Al Qaeda terrorist organization is or even if they exist, is as a pretext to build a permanent US military strike force with a series of permanent US airbases across Afghanistan... The aim of the US bases in Afghanistan is to target and be able to strike at the two nations which today represent the only combined threat in the world today to an American global imperium or to America's Full Spectrum Dominance ~ as the Pentagon terms it." http://www.rense.com/general88/geo.htm

And what are those two nations ~ China and Russia.

Remember Henry Kissinger's famous quote ? "It's not a matter of what is true that counts but a matter of what is perceived to be true."

Remember that quote after President Obama finishes his series of highly publicized Afghanistan song and dance meetings and announces his 'deeply thought out' decision to increase our military presence in Afghanistan ~ of course, with the token promise of eventual withdrawal and a work in progress exit strategy.

It's all a game, folks ! And we are, unfortunately, still letting them play it with our money and the lives of our youth.

Allen L Roland

http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/2009/11/16.html

Freelance Online columnist Allen L Roland is available for comments, interviews and speaking engagements ( allen@allenroland.com )

Allen Roland’s weblog: http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/
Website: www.allenroland.com
ONLY THE TRUTH IS REVOLUTIONARY

RE-DISCOVERING WATER / THE SOURCE OF LIFE

Sun, 15 Nov 2009 18:23:33 GMT

RE-DISCOVERING WATER / THE SOURCE OF LIFE

75 to 90% of the Planet as well as our own human body is composed of water. Water whose actual structural source component can only be activated through love and gratitude: Allen L Roland

Here is a gift for you which may very well change your life for all of us cannot exist without water ~ it is the true source of life ~ and water, in turn, has embedded structural properties which can heal both our bodies and the planet. Source properties which can only be activated through love and gratitude ~ the lifeblood of soul consciousness and the Unified Field .

Take the time today to watch this very special film.

Water (86 minutes)
http://www.viddler.com/explore/ConspiracyFact/videos/73

Allen L Roland

http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/2009/11/15.html

Freelance Online columnist Allen L Roland is available for comments, interviews and speaking engagements ( allen@allenroland.com )

Allen Roland’s weblog: http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/
Website: www.allenroland.com
ONLY THE TRUTH IS REVOLUTIONARY

THE REVOLT OF THE FIFTH ESTATE / THE PEOPLE

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 18:47:33 GMT

THE R EVOLT OF THE FIFTH ESTATE / THE PEOPLE

The fourth Estate, Main Stream Press, is now the voice of the Corporate Oligarchy. But from the ashes of this economy will rise the Fifth Estate, the People, who are already demanding truth and transparency and it's fueled by the Internet. The movement started in Latin America but is now heading north and building momentum. This is what the global elite fear most and it cannot be defeated: Allen L Roland

It was Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn who wrote ~ " You can have power over people as long as you don't take everything away from them. But when you've robbed a man of everything, he's no longer in your power."

America has been looted by Wall Street, the Banking Barons and the Corporate oligarchy but a staggering Main Street, robbed of everything, is slowly arising from their stupor, awakened by the Internet, and are beginning to demand truth and transparency ~ the first important steps toward freedom, true democracy and the resurrection of the fifth Estate ( the people).

Watch Ohio Rep Marcy Kaptur and Simon Johnson, MIT Sloan School of Management, being interviewed by Bill Moyers as they confirm the Coup d'etat by the Wall Street Mega Banks, the shutdown of Congressional oversight and the strong likelihood of a major Depression unless Obama finds a spine. http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/10092009/watch.html

And the current Administration Health Care Reform package is, in reality, without a true public option, a bailout for the too big to fail Insurance giants who want their pound of flesh along with the Mega banks ~ and, of course, at the expense of Main street and the American Taxpayer.

It was Carl Sagan who wrote ~ " One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. The bamboozle has captured us. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back."

America gave away it's power after 9/11 by allowing ourselves to be bamboozled by the Cheney/Bush administration who seized and abused their executive power while flying the banner of the War On Terror. President Obama is riding that same white horse of unlimited executive power as he gets ready to substantially increase our presence in Afghanistan ~ while Congress and the fourth estate ( Main Steam Press ) fall dutifully and lock step in line.

The Fifth Estate ( the American Public ) drank the Cheney/Bush kool aid and are now beginning to wake up and clearly see the bamboozle that they willingly bought into and that is, in many ways, still being perpetrated by the Obama administration.

In that regard, please read John Pilger's Breaking The Great Australian Silence ~ A speech pilger gave on November 6, 2009 while accepting the Peace Prize from the Sidney Peace Foundation.

Pilger's candid remarks directly relate to Australia's Rudd government but also to the Obama administration ~ " According to the great whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg, a military coup has taken place in the United States, with the Pentagon now ascendant in every aspect of foreign policy.
It doesn't matter who is president ~ George Bush or Barack Obama. Indeed, Obama has stepped up Bush's wars and started his own war in Pakistan. Like Bush, he is threatening Iran, a country Hillary Clinton said she was prepared to "annihilate". Iran's crime is its independence.
Having thrown out America's favorite dictator, the Shah, Iran is the only resource-rich Muslim country beyond American control. It doesn't occupy anyone else's land and hasn't attacked any country ~ unlike Israel, which is nuclear-armed and dominates and divides the Middle East on America's behalf."

Pilger correctly and refreshingly summarizes America's record while calling ourselves The arsenal of freedom ~ " Since the second world war, the arsenal of freedom has overthrown 50 governments, including democracies, and crushed some 30 liberation movements. Millions of people all over the world have been driven out of their homes and subjected to crippling embargos. Bombing is as American as apple pie .. More than 800 American bases are ready for war and these bases protect a system that allows one per cent of humanity to control 40 per cent of wealth: a system that bails out just one bank with $180 billion."

Pilger speaks of breaking the great Australian silence and uses a famous Shelley quote to make his point ~

Rise like lions after slumber

In unvanquishable number

Shake your chains to earth like dew

Which in sleep has fallen on you

Ye are many - they are few

And these words are completely appropriate for the great American silence which can only be broken by the awakening of the fifth estate ~ the American public. Pilger correctly senses that now is that moment ~

" But we need to make haste. An historic shift is taking place. The major western democracies are moving towards a corporatism. Democracy has become a business plan, with a bottom line for every human activity,every dream, every decency, every hope. The main parliamentary parties
are now devoted to the same economic policies ~ socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor - and the same foreign policy of servility to endless war.
This is not democracy. It is to politics what McDonalds is to food.
How do we change this ? We start by looking beyond the stereotypes and clichés that are fed to us as news. Tom Paine warned long ago that if we were denied critical knowledge, we should storm what he called the Bastille of words. Tom Paine did not have the internet, but the internet on its own is not enough. We need an Australian glasnost, the Russian word from the Gorbachev era, which broadly means awakening, transparency, diversity, justice, disobedience. It was Edmund Burke who spoke of the press as a Fourth Estate. I propose a people's Fifth Estate that monitors, deconstructs
and counters the official news. In every news room, in every media college, teachers of journalism and journalists themselves need to be challenged about the part they play in the bloodshed, inequity and silence that is so often presented as normal.
The public are not the problem. It's true some people don't give a damn ~ but millions do, as I know from the responses to my own films. What people want is to be engaged ~ a sense that things matter, that nothing is immutable, that unemployment among the young and poverty among the old are both uncivilized and wrong. What terrifies the agents of power is the awakening of people: of public consciousness.
This is already happening in countries in Latin America where ordinary people have discovered a confidence in themselves they did not know existed. We should join them before our own freedom of speech is quietly withdrawn and real dissent is outlawed as the powers of the police are expanded.
"The struggle of people against power," wrote Milan Kundera, "is the struggle of memory against forgetting." http://www.zcommunications.org/zspace/commentaries/4036

We are many and they are few ~ it's time for action. Prepare to nonviolently resist. It was Cesar Chavez who said ~ The first principal of nonviolent action is that of noncooperation with everything humiliating.

Allen L Roland http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/2009/11/13.html

Freelance Online columnist Allen L Roland is available for comments, interviews and speaking engagements ( allen@allenroland.com )

Allen Roland’s weblog: http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/
Website: www.allenroland.com
ONLY THE TRUTH IS REVOLUTIONARY

FT HOOD QUESTION / WAS IT DRUG INDUCED DEMENTIA ?

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:51:47 GMT

FT HOOD QUESTION / WAS IT DRUG INDUCED DEMENTIA ?

Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the U.S. Army doctor named as a suspect in the shooting death of 13 people and the wounding of 31 others at Fort Hood, Texas. Photo GETTY

Unlike modern Psychotherapy ~ most modern drug dispensing Psychiatry, particularly in the military, is about controlling and suppressing their patients, through psychotropic drugs, which takes a huge toll on both the patient and doctor ~ as it most likely did with the Ft Hood shooter, Major Nidal Malik Hasan: Allen L Roland

As a practicing Psychotherapist, I love and am continually energized by the short term counseling I perform with my clients where I rapidly empower them to heal themselves by jump starting their hearts and then take responsibility for love in their life, versus running away from it ~ and thus healing themselves in the process. SESSIONS

Most Psychiatry, on the other hand, is about controlling and quite often suppressing the client's emotional damage through psychotropic drugs which may offer a short term fix but barely touch the deep emotional or soul damage ~ as seen in a typical military victim of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. For example, Here is Frank's story of how he conquered his deep unworthiness issues associated with PTSD while working with me. http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/2008/03/31.html

Which leads me to a Fort Hood unanswered question and perhaps the never answered question ~ was military psychiatrist Major Nidal Malik Hasan himself a victim of drug induced dementia from the very same drugs he was dispensing to his soldiers ?

I think the answer is YES which leads me to Dr. Peter Breggin, a psychiatrist who has written extensively for over 20 years about the phenomenon of drug-induced mental ill health and drug-induced brain-damage. http://www.breggin.com/

Dr. Breggin recently wrote an article about the Fort Hood shooting episode that was entitled “The Fort Hood Shooter: A Different Psychiatric Perspective” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-peter-breggin/the-fort-hood-shooter-a-d_b_349651.html

Here are some pertinent excerpts:

" Modern psychiatry is not about counseling and empowering people. It's about controlling and suppressing them, and that's a dismal affair for patients and doctors alike. The armed forces have been taken in by the false claims of modern psychiatry..... By contrast, it's not depressing to do psychotherapy or counseling. As therapists, it's inspiring when people entrust their feelings and their life stories to us. There is no burn out when therapists feel concern and empathy for their patients and help them to find the strength and direction to reclaim their lives.... But being an ordinary psychiatrist is deadly depressing. Psychiatrists routinely commit spiritual murder by disregarding and suppressing their patients' feelings and even their cognitive functions, making it impossible for them to conquer their emotional struggles. It's no wonder my colleagues have such high suicide and drug addiction rates....The most recent data show that soldiers are being snowed under not only with antidepressants and tranquilizers, but increasingly with antipsychotic drugs like Risperdal, Zyprexa, Geodon and Seroquel. To cover up their own therapeutic impotence, psychiatrists chemically suppress our troops and push them back onto the front lines... Psychiatrists are notorious for treating themselves with psychiatric drugs. They have them freely available and they simply don't know anything different. The odds are that Dr. Hasan was self-medicating with antidepressants and tranquilizers that were causing his increasing disinhibition, at least in his pronouncements, until his final Allahu Akbar before he began shooting. "

Dr Breggin's concluding thought particularly rang a bell with myself, as a psychotherapist ~ " Modern psychiatry is a violent and suppressive profession whose values are alien to the liberty and responsibility advocated by our Founders and upheld by our armed services. It's time for the army to reject the false promises and damaging effects of modern psychiatry, and to focus on psychological, educational and moral approaches that genuinely help soldiers to prepare for and to overcome the effects of combat stress."

Amen, to that !

As Dr Gary G. Kohls recently wrote ~ " Modern-day psychiatric drugs are notorious for causing people to numb down, to become indifferent to the suffering of others and themselves, to become manic, depressed, psychotic, irrational, impulsive, anorexic or demented. It is important to note that Fort Hood has been averaging ten suicides a month among military personnel. "

Also note that 75 soldiers have committed suicide at Fort Hood ~ the highest of any base ~ and that Ft Hood is a prime point of departure for troops headed to Iraq and Afghanistan. Obviously the emotional stress of participating in the unpopular occupation of both Iraq and Afghanistan has effected both the soldiers and medical staff of that base.

Which leads me to the still unanswered question ~ and the answer may very well be that Major Hasan, like many of the soldiers he treated, was a victim of his own self medication and made an important statement with his own drug induced dementia and the horrific actions that followed. By the way, Dr Hasan had a drawer full of psychotropic drugs in his apartment (See pictures of Nidal Malik Hasan's apartment.) http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1938415,00.html?xid=thepage_newsletter

Allen L Roland http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/2009/11/11.html

Freelance Online columnist Allen L Roland is available for comments, interviews and speaking engagements ( allen@allenroland.com )

Allen Roland’s weblog: http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/
Website: www.allenroland.com
ONLY THE TRUTH IS REVOLUTIONARY

COCO BEFORE CHANEL / MY REVIEW

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:39:04 GMT

COCO BEFORE CHANEL / MY REVIEW

This Parisian movie poster was banned in Paris because Tautou was pictured smoking a cigarette.

Audrey Tautou's fierce performance as Coco Chanel is a must see tour de force for two reasons ~ she fully captures an ambitious emotionally damaged woman who uses love to eventually claim her gift and, in the process, illuminates the true intent of love: Allen L Roland

I went to see this film with no expectations but was more than pleasantly surprised. The film, as the title suggests, depicts the early life of a woman who probably became the single most important figure in 20th century fashion ~ but writer and director Anne Fontaine artfully creates a touching story within that story that stands by itself as a testament to the will and courage of the truly gifted among us.

All of us are emotionally damaged in childhood, as Coco most certainly was as an orphaned young child, but not all of us have the courage and will to rise above that carnage and capture our original joy, intention and purpose.

Fontaine, perhaps unconsciously, captures that journey which almost always coincides with the heart's journey ~ for each of Coco's love relationships end up helping and eventually support her deep unfolding desire to make a statement in the world of fashion.

There is a lesson here ~ for the true path of the heart should always eventually lead to the full and honest expression of yourself and your gift ~ as Coco's most certainly does.

A.O Scott, N.Y. Times, calls the film " An unusually vivid and convincing account of the historical past, composed in the present sense. Though its moods and methods are different, Coco before Chanel shares with Jane Campion's Bright Star a fascination, at once intense and dispassionate, with the lives of women in earlier centuries...Coco and Fanny Brawne, the heroine of Ms. Campion's film, are not victims of oppression or paragons of resistance but rather individuals, made not of ideology or wishful thinking but of flesh and blood."

And that is precisely my point in this review, for Tautou's Coco is all flesh and blood ~ playful and difficult, chain-smoking and sarcastic, trusting and wary, vulnerable and hard but underneath it all ticks a burning ambition and a song to sing.

Allen L Roland http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/2009/11/09.html

Freelance Online columnist Allen L Roland is available for comments, interviews and speaking engagements ( allen@allenroland.com )

Allen Roland’s weblog: http://blogs.salon.com/0002255/
Website: www.allenroland.com
ONLY THE TRUTH IS REVOLUTIONARY