TED TURNER January 29, 2015

Just when too many of us despaired about  billionaires and such, someone came along. Fell off my screen and into my lap as it were. Saw pictures-cute-and read on my computer about a guy who owns more land in America than any other American. Two million acres of personal and ranch land. That’s’a’lot’a square feet.

What does he do with it? This question coming from a lady who once lived in comfortable middle class territory but who has downed-or upped-her economic status bt managing to survive as upper lower. I got some land. 160,000 square feet of jungle to walk around on. Aint so bad. I got shelter, transportation, feed me and my zoo, Aristotle-my famous horse-a grown up puppy, two cats, one hen and a Macaw and, so far, manage to pay my bills.

So who is this guy?

His name is Ted Turner. I started with his quotes. I’m a writer. I love quotes. “The sad thing about destroying the environment is that we’re going to take the rest of life with us. The bluebirds will be gone, and the elephants will be gone, and the tigers will be gone, and the pandas will be gone.”

I fell off my stool. Plunked off on my skinny okole. Picked myself up, brushed myself, and began to google.

Mr. Turner, I read, managed to unite economic with ecological sustainability. Relying on bison and hunting/fishing/nature and tourism. On his web I see a picture of happy bison in green grass. I see gorgeous open land and hear he created this “…to save the land from development.”

Another quote, “I love this planet…I want to see the environment preserved and I want to see everybody living decently in a more equitable, kind-hearted, thoughtful, generous world.”

He’s an incredible philanthropist. His foundations. The Ted Turner Foundation (TFI) supports efforts for improving air and water quality, developing a sustainable energy future to protect our climate, safeguard our environmental health, maintaining wildlife habitat protection, and developing practices and policies to curb population growth rates.

Mr. Turner?  May I call you Ted? Speaking for many of us on Kauai who like coquis, crowing roosters, parakeets, feral pigs and goats and cats and the beauty we are surrounded with on our little piece of paradise, please help us out.

We are threatened with over development. Suburban sprawl.

Destruction of our air, waterways, and soil by powerful corporations-with dollar signs instead of hearts-who would turn Kauai into one vast experimental plantation. Growing GMO corn we cannot eat. Producing milk we cannot drink in a milk factory that threatens every living thing in its path.

We invite you to visit us. Stay with us. Bed and breakfast. Free. As long as you like. Incognito. Meet interesting guys. RSVP

My horse, Aristotle-who in a previous life was a famous philosopher-told me to write this. He said, “Even billionaires love a free lunch.”

 

 

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DON’T CONFUSE FEAR WITH COMMON SENSE January 24, 2015

Scared, Seigfried? No. It’s just many of us have good sense. For the county — or GMO farmers — to use a toxic spray that kills the bees is beyond stupid. It’s insane. Imagine, a world without bees to pollinate.

We have egg factories, pig factories, beef factories, milk factories, where the animals never see the sun, live in such a cramped, sick environment only multiple use of drugs keep them alive. The food they produce for human consumption isn’t fit to eat.

Thank goodness we do not fluoridate our water supply.

Pill pushers? Come on doctor, every time we take a drug, we weaken our immune system. There are times — but they are few and far between — when a drug can save a life but those of us who have good sense, and have nurtured and tended our own good health, quite often manage to avoid them. You’d be surprised.

And you can’t intimidate me, Seigfried, just because you have a couple letters in front of your name.

Further, if I were you, I’d be careful about bringing up the past. A list a mile long of medical nonsense — historical horrors — and “pseudo” science mistakes, could fill this page. Don’t tempt me.

We need to grow food for health instead of wealth. Produce milk children can drink. We need to restore the health of the soil, diversify and create jobs for people instead of a few mindless puppets, who dance for a dollar when someone with too many of them pulls the strings.

Bettejo Dux, Kalaheo 

`Posts: 97

Aloha Bettejo, we are going to frame your comment today…it has never been said so concise and thorough.

Congratulations Bettejo Dux! A well written letter on a very serious subject. One question though? Why didn’t you support Bush and Romney, instead of the Cretan you’ve pushed on everyone for the past 6 years, you would have been a lot closer to your stated goals! There would have been a short, instead of long, “depression”, the economy would be strong, deficits and debt would be in good shape, and jobs would be everywhere. Now that’s the environment needed to easily make the changes and fix the things you’ve made us aware of. Oh well, sure hope you learned something?

`A fine letter Bettejo. The last paragraph says it all. Thank you for your response to this nonsense.

Thank you, Bettejo, for your letter. What irked me about this “doctor” is the language he used, like he was speaking to a bunch of seventh graders. Those of us with half a brain can see through this guy…SHILL!!!!!!!!!!!!

January 14, 2015

What if the governments of the world wised up? What if all of them simply stated, a decree, “You are no longer in debt. You owe no one. Everything you have is yours. Your house, your car, you furniture, your appliances, your clothes. Even your horse.

We’re gonna start all over. Monopoly style. Every family on the planet will be given- or allowed- $10,000. Maximum.

Credit cards, interest? Down the drain. Ain’t no more. Keep the yen, the dollars, the pesos-the long colored paper stuff-in limited supply. Burn the rest-beats burning books-think of the lovely bonfires. Roast hot dogs, marshmallows, chestnuts, tomatoes. Warm the tootsies.

I’m not an economist-whadda I know-but I think everything would level out. Buy a cuppa coffee or a soda for a nickel? Rent for a three bedroom house, a hundred bucks a month? Water, electricity, twenty bucks? Executive salaries. A thousand a month? Too high? Lower it.

Idiots in corporations, big business and banks, wouldn’t have to play the accounting game. They owe as much they own? That’s pretty stupid. Can’t you rich guys live on your income just as we-the peasants of the world-do?

You can keep your often atrocious living quarters and mansions. Check’em out. How is it possible to have such bad taste? You can float around in your enormous yachts, wear disgusting looking outfits, stick diamond and emeralds in every orifice known to man or woman, hop around in your jets and helicopters and limousines, as long as you feed your kids and animals.

Your dead and buried race horses can still have mile high mounds of flowers on their graves, and your barns be trimmed in silver and gold, but don’t forget to feed them. I haven’t a clue what you’ll do with that multi level race course, Happy Valley, in the heart of Hong Kong, other than let us peasants watch the show. Free. No betting allowed.

Guys, try to find and take a gander at a teNeues book, edited by Wolfgang Behnken called Luxury Equestrian Design. We must always remember what peasants we are. I love horses and I think they should be kept in luxury. I mean kept- like their women are kept- but don’t forget the horses. Tell me, would they care for them so much if there were no money in it?

The Racing & Society Chapter is a hoot and a holler.

Some of those women are decked out in elaborate and extraordinary tents. Do they keep clowns and elephants under there? The hats are darling!

F. Scott Fitzgerald, “The rich are different from us,” and Barbara Ward said, “If there were an insane asylum in the Solar System, it would be planet earth.”

I ask, “How is it the elite, who run the place, can always afford another war but can never afford to feed, house or educate us?”

I think a new deal-we’re gonna get there soon enough anyhow- is better than putting the planet up for foreclosure. Don’t you?

 

 

 

THE WHISTLE BLOWER January 8, 2015

I must confess, just as Germaine Greer infiltrated Hefner’s Playboy Clubs and Jeff Sharlet infiltrated Ivanwald, in Arlington, so did I.

Not as a scholar or historian,  but as a cat whose curiosity got the best of her. At the Potomac Point house, Ivanwald for young women, I arrived one day- an invited guest, I’ll never tell by whom- carrying a cheap wicker suitcase with a hidden space in the bottom.

The house was just across the road from the Cedars, and the place where young women came to serve. We cooked and cleaned and served the men. Some of them quite cute, all of them there to be indoctrinated into this goofy religion.

Us girls were allowed to wear lipstick and dress in feminine attire when on ‘duty’. I thought it pretty white of them, but, in the beginning, I kept the thought to myself. The ‘brothers’ as the men were called, did all the outside work and we watched; but none of us was allowed to sit in on the meals because they were mostly ‘politics’ which the Bible taught were reserved for the men. We were weak, you see.

Many of the girls dressed in cute little Eva Braun costumes. This group had great affection for Hitler’s style, as one of the girls reminded me. “Hitler never looked at another woman once he met Eva,” she said. The Norwegian founder of the Christian Mafia, Abraham Veride, had a fondness for Nazis. Many joined his early prayer circles in the postwar years. We indulge frequently on Kauai, today.

I was not interested, at that time, in their political or economic philosophy, I was interested in their brainwashing techniques. So early on, at night, before going to bed, I broke the rules. I’d dig around in the secret bottom of my suitcase and haul out some scandalous Victoria’s Secret goodies. The shocked and disapproving faces of some of them amused me, but, before long, I got some of the younger ones to play the game. I had great fun sexing them up.

In many ways the house on the Point was like Hugh Hefner’s Bunny Hutches, except no one was invited to sleep with Doug Coe. He was so cute and the guy who took Abraham’s place when Abraham went to heaven. Coe was the one who really knew Jesus and we were taught in the house to emulate his wife, Jan, who deserved much of the credit for her husband’s work. She was “So uncomplaining. Staying put and waiting patiently.”

I would like to end this by saying, like Jeff and Germaine, I went home and wrote an expose about these nuts, but I didn’t. I just blow the whistle on occasion. Enjoyed a few secret moments peering with a few others, watching them play ‘Fumble’ a weird wrestling snake games on the floor inside the house. “It’s scripture in action,” one of the girls said.

“”If that’s scripture,” I said, “I’ll pass.”

I did spring a few cuties. Three of us packed and escaped one night. We keep in touch.