Ray's X-Blog

2012-01-13T03:51:00.004-05:00

Rosary Workout

For some people exercise is their religion. But what if you could combine physical and spiritual fitness in one program?

Author Peggy Bowes, a devout Catholic, has the answer. Through her book, "The Rosary Workout," you can discover how to pray and exercise at the same time.

I was completely unaware of this Rosary-exercise combo until I happened to hear Peggy on the radio while dialing through the shortwave band. EWTN, the Eternal Word Television Network, has a SW radio outlet. EWTN is a cable TV channel started up by a nun in the 1980s to reach the masses to draw them to the masses (and the collective collection plate). Peggy was a guest on the program, "Blessed 2 Play," described as "spiritual sports radio."

For those of you unaware of the Rosary, it is a set of prayer beads that loops back on itself, a circle with one row hanging from the bottom with a small crucifix. Think of a large O with a tail. The prayer holds a bead between thumb and forefinger, each bead representing a prayer that has to be said in proper sequence.

The saying of the Rosary can taken some time, especially if the person is meditating on the spiritual aspect of the rite which is supposed to be the whole point of the rite. But with practice it can be over fairly quickly. One time I attended a funeral and the priest sped along as he lead everyone in prayer. His rate of utterance was close to what you hear on TV or radio when the ad announcer races through all the disclaimers, twenty-seconds-worth of words said in less than five. I'm not judging that priest; maybe he was running late and had another funeral to attend or a bad bladder.

At amazon.com there's this review of "The Rosary Workout:"

Kneel. Stand. Sit. Stand. Kneel again. "Catholic calisthenetics" is no longer just for church! The Rosary Workout is the real thing: exercise science and authentic Catholic teachings combined to strengthen body and soul and deepen your awareness of God's presence in every facet of your life.

I find this concept of saying the Rosary to regulate exercise a bit disconcerting. I was raised by parents devoted to the Roman Catholic Church. The Rosary was a sacred rite not to be mixed with ordinary secular activities. It was to be used for times of deep meditation or special intervention.

For example, a family needed a miracle: one member was in the hospital, dying from a terminal illness. The rest of the family knelt together in the living room of their home and prayed the entire Rosary, beseeching through the Blessed Virgin Mary for Godly grace.

But to go to the gym and work out on a treadmill while saying the Rosary, getting sweaty while toning your sexy bod? OK, that's not as extreme as an adulterer saying penance while copulating with his mistress but...

For a long time I've been a "lapsed Catholic" (AKA devout atheist). So I'm not upset by this new trend to tap into the yuppie need for a trim body. I just find it strange. Go back five decades in Catholic time and such a proposal would be considered heresy.

But times have changed. During the interview Peggy said her husband wasn't Catholic. In the dark ages that wouldn't have flown. Back in the 1970s you could read in a textbook for Catholic high school students that Catholics should only marry other others of the One True Faith. No unions with non-Catholics. The person of the "lesser faith" had to convert to Catholicism.

So with faith mixing comes exercise-Rosary mixing. But this isn't surprising, considering the severe financial hit the Roman Catholic Church has taken from being on the losing end of lawsuits involving pedophile priests. Of course, the church was reprehensible, covering up the misdeeds of child molesting priests while moving them to another parishes where the priests could easily sin again (and did).

Listening to Peggy Bowes on the radio, she sounds like a very pleasant lady who sincerely believes that her program can benefit everyone, even non-Catholics. Praying the Rosary, she stated, attracts the presence of good angels while driving away the bad ones (demons).

Angels are an important aspect. She wanted to use the concept of nine choirs of angels for her exercise program but in her research she found that some expressed doubts whether it was biblical. Then one day during a beautiful sunset she saw a sign: nine mini-clouds in the sky.

Me, the last few wintry days around here have been generally overcast, dark and depressing. I take that as another sign there is no God.

2012-01-08T04:03:00.004-05:00

2012: The Year The World Ends (Again)

It’s another new year in which we’re faced with eschatological excrement of a taurine nature.

In 2011 biblical scholar/radio broadcaster Harold Camping was rapping that the Rapture was happening on May 21. Some of his followers emptied their bank accounts, donating all to the cause: billboards, books, etc. Money gone forever.

Nothing happened.

Camping’s organization said sorry, no refunds.

Then Harold said he was a bit off with his calculations, that all good Xtians would bodily ascend into Heaven on October 21 before the world was destroyed. Again, nothing.

Between his two predictions Harold suffered a mild stroke that affected his speech. This prompted one Xtian Website to pose the question: “Was Harold Camping's stroke punishment from God?”

In the meantime it seems that the only world that is ending is Camping’s.

After such events in 2011 you think we would get some time off from the End Times. No such luck.

This time the target date is 12/21/12, based on the Mayan calendar. There’s been enough buzz about that scenario so I won't rehash it. Instead I want to focus on a lesser known Prophet of Doom: Nancy Lieder of zetatalk.com .

Nancy is one of those believers in Planet X, that rogue orb that will or already has entered our solar system to wreak havoc.

Back in 2003 she said Planet X was here. She told listeners on a radio program that they should put down their pets. After all, it would be hard to feed Fido and Fluffy when everyone was scrounging for food.

I wonder how many prematurely euthanized critters ended up in pet cemeteries due to her failed prediction.

Where does Nancy get her inside info on the cosmic timetable? From a brain implant courtesy of some aliens from the star system Zeta Reticuli, made famous by the Betty and Barney hill abduction.

Nancy has said in Zeta Report videos available via YouTube that through the Zetas she has met many different kinds of aliens. Cartoonish illustrations of these myriad ET types are included in the videos. One time she met a “Beanbag man” with a slug body. Another time she met an eight-foot dinosaur being that had a kind soul like Mother Teresa. Cold blooded doesn’t mean cold hearted, she points out.

Obviously Nancy is in a unique position to predict the future.

And as for her failed 2003 prediction, she stated that it was a “white lie” to fool The Powers That Be. She has stated she won’t reveal the date because that would give the Establishment enough time to declare martial law and hinder survival efforts.

In the meantime some people are connecting her Planet X with the doomsday talk related to the Mayan calendar. So when December 21 rolls around be prepared for a near miss or collision.

Or nothing.

2012-01-08T04:00:00.005-05:00

Critical Skepchick Shows Uncritical Thinking

I almost missed this item from last year: Elevatorgate!

Rebecca Watson, leader of a core of skeptical women over at skepchick.org, was attending a conference in Dublin, Ireland during June 2011 and a guy in an elevator hit on her (or so she claims). No, the man didn’t assault her, just asked her back to his room to discuss various issues over a cup of coffee.

Apparently Rebecca didn’t like being a hittee. Her lecture topic at the conference dealt with anti-feminism. It really bugged her the Elevator Guy was “sexualizing” her.

Really. Is this the same Rebecca Watson who posed nude for Skepchick calendars?

It’s too bad that the Elevator Guy got the shaft.

2011-12-25T21:21:00.005-05:00

Hey, Dude, Where’s My Brown Dwarf?

Man, don’t you just hate it? Just when there’s proof of something eXtradordinary – BANG! – the Trickster yanks the evidence away.

A while ago I was talking about Tolec, a man who claims to be in contact with the alien races of the Andromeda Council. Tolec has made all sorts of claims about our world shifting into a fourth-dimensional reality.

One sign or proof of this approaching shift, claimed Tolec, was that a brown dwarf star would appear in our solar system. At some point this brown dwarf would ignite into a second sun. Hmmm, I wonder if he ever read the book or had seen the movie, “2010: The Year We Make Contact?”

Obviously a brown dwarf drifting into our neighborhood would be notable. Especially among astronomers. It was supposed to arrive by now so why nothing in the news? Are “They” (shadow government types) suppressing the info?

Not really, according to Tolec. The Andromeda Council had cloaked the brown dwarf. It’s still there, waiting to ignite, but our primitive terran tech can’t detect it.

One wonders who’s really the Trickster in all of this.

2011-12-25T21:18:00.001-05:00

Today’s Personal eXpression

The real reason for the season:

So how much loot did you score?

Did you buy enough to keep the economy going, thus enabling the elite 1% to grow even richer?

2011-12-25T21:17:00.000-05:00

What's Red And White, Red And White?

There’s an interesting display in one part of town. Throughout the year a homeowner displays a large Confederate flag in his front window, an object usually associated with racism.

But when the happy holiday season rolls around the homeowner adds an eXmas display with his flag. Besides the traditional lights he adds stuffed almost-life-sized dummies of Santa and Mrs. Claus sitting in chairs on his front porch.

Isn’t Santa egalitarian, delivering gifts and love to all of mankind? That apparently depends upon one’s POV.

In the case of the local display under consideration Kris Kringle is the ultimate symbol of so-called racial purity.

Talk about a white eXmas.

2011-12-25T21:12:00.003-05:00

Tall Whites

No, I’m not talking about elongated people of Nordic bloodlines but instead aliens, as in extra-terrestrials.

Since there seems to be a “white” theme popping up with my latest posts, I might as well wrap up with this topic.

Back in 1965-1967 Airman Charles Hall served at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada near Area 51. He was trained as a weather observer but ended up observing more than the weather: he encountered ETs who had the general appearance of the archetypical gray but were tall and white.

Hall claims that he saw the ETs and humans, both military and business types, intermingling. The aliens would give humans rides to the Earth’s moon in their scout ships. One time the tall whites offered to give some US Generals a ride to Ganymede, one of Jupiter’s moons, to prove it was unsuitable as a military base.

The tall whites sometimes communicated by making loud sounds like the whinnying of horses.

Of course, all of this was supposed to be Top Secret but Hall decided to let the world know through a series of books he has written, “The Millennial Hospitality Series.”

If tall white ETS are on this planet, my advice for them is to avoid most parts of the rural Deep South. Not everyone there is a bigot but…

You tall whites might have (more or less) the right skin type but not body form. Southern bigots hate freaks of any type. Talk like a horse whinnying – forget it! Hey, I experienced extreme prejudice down there for just having a northern accent.

2011-12-15T03:26:00.001-05:00

Quick! Activate A Three-Name H-Bomb

Beware, New World Order. Al Parker has figured it out.

During the last meeting of the Liberty Net he connected all the dots. He stated that the conspirators decided that the public had to be distracted from any more bad news about politician-businessman Jon Corzine and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.

A former New Jersey governor, Jon Corzine was CEO of the investment company MF Global until he resigned on November 4, 2011. He retained the services of a lawyer as federal regulators probed into the matter of missing customer funds amounting to millions of dollars.

Meanwhile AG Holder has his own problems, dealing with investigations into Operation Fast and Furious, a sting operation under the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms in which the sale of illegal weapons were facilitated and tracked by the ATF. Most of the weapons were sold to criminal organizations in Mexico to build a case against those groups. In December 2010 there was a gunfight near Rio Rico, Arizona, resulting in the death of a US Border Patrol agent. Two of the weapons found at the scene were traced back to Fast and Furious.

Thursday, December 8th saw Corzine giving testimony to the House Agriculture Committee while AG Holder appeared before the House Judiciary Committee.

And on that same day there was a shooting at Virginia Tech, a man killing a police officer before turning the gun on himself and committing suicide.

It didn't take Al Parker, a longtime contributor to the Liberty Net, long to figure out the connection between all three events.

The Virginia Tech shooter -- Ross Truett Ashley -- was probably a programmed human time bomb, Parker explained to the other ultra-right-wing ham radio operators. Notice the name, he said. Compare it to other notorious shooters like Lee Harvey Oswald. Not a coincidence.

Apparently the conspirators like to program domestic Manchurian Candidates -- or h-bombs, if you will -- who are known by three names. (Maybe we should keep an eye on country music singer Billy Ray Cyrus.)

Parker claimed that the Virginia Tech shooter was activated to focus news away from the respective Corzine and Holder testimonies. Also, he added, it helped to play on public fears, making it easier to pass stricter gun control laws.

If you looked into the shooter's past, guaranteed Parker, you would find that Ashley had participated in some sort of internship or study, either through the FBI or a local military base. Parker left the impression this is how the shooter was mentally re-wired to go berserk when needed.

But what if the shooter was a regular listener to the Liberty Net? I wonder...

(The archived recording of the last LibNet gathering can be found at www.3950.net. In the upper right-hand corner click on "Liberty Net - 2011-1210." Parker's statements can be found around the 4 hour 30 minute mark.)

2011-12-05T03:17:00.005-05:00

Liberty Net: Genocide

There are various ways to describe genocide and the forms it may take. Leave it to the Liberty Net to provide an unique twist on the concept.

Below is an audio excerpt of the last Saturday-night-into-Sunday-morning get-together by the ultra-right-wing ham radio operators. The complete file can be found archived at http://3950.net/ as "Liberty Net - 2011-1203." I heard these statements early Sunday morning (12/4/11) while listening via the Web. This part of the discussion can be found around the 2:58 marker of the original file.

Can't you feel the love?

And don't forget: God doesn't change.

2011-11-27T02:03:00.002-05:00

Take That, You Dirty Rats!

The Andromeda Council has been killing “the rats under the wood pile.”

Or so claims Tolec, human representative of the AC on earth. In a YouTube interview dated Sept. 30, 2011 (http://youtu.be/mRpCV3pK6jY) Tolec spoke off-camera with Alfred Webre, exopolitics writer/researcher, about the DUMBs (deep underground military bases) where evil reptilian and gray aliens have been feeding off the intense emotions of unsuspecting humans.

Those emotions have been generated by beam weapons that stoke hate and fear, causing more conflict and violence, especially in places like the Mid-East. Tolec claims the aliens feed on these emotions like psychic vampires.

Smacks a bit of sci fi, huh? The hidden underground bases sound like they’re straight out of a Richard Shaver story. His tales appeared in the old pulp magazine, “Amazing Stories,” but he claimed they were based on truth. Beneath the earth lurked the Deros who preyed on mankind above. One reader wrote to the mag to say that he knew the Shaver Mystery was true; his wife heard voices and it had to be those damn Deros.

And as for feeding on emotion, Eric Frank Russell wrote a novel called “Sinister Barrier” (1939) that involved glowing blue critters called Vitons, mental vampires that liked stirring up trouble for mankind to satisfy their cravings.

But who’s to say that life can’t imitate art, that is, the art of SF?

The story of the Andromeda Council is indeed a sweeping saga, one to rival the Foundation series by Isaac Asimov. At the home page for a Terran website devoted to AC activities – www.andromedacouncil.com – there is this message:

“We of the star systems & planets of the Andromeda Council are your family & friends. We are here to let you know your planet Earth/Terra and all of your people are about to go through major changes, a major stage of growth, a shift-up in vibration, called ‘upliftment’. It is a completely new vibration…”

Hey, I’m into new vibes.

Do you feel a difference?

During one interview with Alfred Webre, Tolec explained that the Earth is now traveling into an area of space that is starting the shift. It’s happening right now.

People of Earth will have a choice to move on to the higher 4D plane where their bodies will become lighter and crystalline. Crystalline? Knowing my luck I’ll end up with 4D kidney stones.

Tolec claims that the reptilian and gray underground bases are being taken out so that the evil aliens won’t be able to interfere with the 4D shift.

So if a tremor somewhere in the world makes the news – and Tolec does track them – don’t be surprised if you hear that it’s evidence of another sinister DUMB being taken out.

Go AC team!

2011-11-27T01:49:00.004-05:00

Jim Moseley Is On The Case: The Cash-Landrum Incident

Image: www.nicap.org/cashlan.htm

Was the Cash-Landrum UFO really a secret military project that screwed up?

December 29th, 1980. Two women and a boy are in a car traveling on a road through thick woodland, on their way to Dayton, Texas. Their journey is interrupted by a strange diamond-shaped craft floating over the road being escorted or pursued by military helicopters.

The bottom of the UFO is open, emitting light and heat. The UFO leaves with the helicopters.

Later, the three people in the car suffer health problems after the incident, apparently related to radiation exposure.

In his zine, “Saucer Smear,” Jim Moseley has been taking another look at the case. He mentioned it to me in a recent phone conversation to see if I could dig up any info online about the case like others have done for him.

Well, my investigation as such is preliminary. I took a wild chance with the search words like “atomic hot air balloon” and found a paper entitled “SMALL NUCLEAR-POWERED HOT AIR BALLOONS FOR THE EXPLORATION OF THE DEEP ATMOSPHERE OF URANUS AND NEPTUNE.”

I also searched for “atomic power aircraft” and discovered back during the Cold War about attempts to build a nuclear powered airplane. Even the evil commie Russians were working on such a craft.

I can see it now: two ato-planes collide in the air over a populated area. Time to call in the FAA and the NRC. I wonder who would have jurisdiction over the investigation.

So far no real hits related to the Cash-Landrum UFO as a secret US military FUBAR. Sorry, Jim.

I plan to write more about ato-vehicles – cars and planes -- when I have more time to follow up.

2011-11-25T03:58:00.003-05:00

New Links

And to make it easier to find me on the Web...

www.x-rayer.com -- Takes you straight to this blog.

www.x-rayer.info -- Access to my newer Website.

With each one, don't forget the hyphen.

And my old Website, www.rayxr.webs.com, still features an archive of my print zines.

2011-11-24T22:10:00.000-05:00

Note

With the eXception of creating my zine, today was a lot of nothing. Very quiet here in the one-man “monastery.” My personal reaction to it all: ThanX for nothing.

And people wonder why I hate the holidays.

At least I enjoyed the traditional microwaved lasagna.

2011-11-21T03:19:00.004-05:00

Reality Anchor

Anchor babies?

That sounded nasty. I wasn't familiar with the term until its ugly head reared on the Liberty Net Stickam site (http://www.stickam.com/libertynet) early Sunday morning (9/20/11). Besides broadcasting over shortwave radio, the ultra-right-wing amateur radio operators also communicate with each other online through both audio and text.

When the site is live it has a comments section for typing in reactions to the audio discussion. The comments just keep scrolling up, the newest on the bottom. Unfortunately they disappear when the site shuts down.

I spotted this statement:

dhauer: All anchor babies should be dumped..
dhauer: overboard
dhauer: there, I said it

With a quick Google search (e.g., "anchor baby myth") I learned that the pejorative "anchor baby" refers to a child born in the United States whose parents are immigrants. That child is automatically granted US citizenship under the 14th Amendment, supposedly "anchoring" his parents so that they can also become American citizens.

Of course, some of the angry white men on the LibNet believe this is a threat to the dominance of their pure race. But according to sources I found online, the threat -- if you call even call it that -- isn't real. Getting US citizenship is difficult for most immigrant parents.

"The practical immigration benefit of having a child born in the US is disputed; family reunification (family-based immigration) in the United States is a lengthy process and limited by law to categories prescribed by provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965." ("Anchor Baby," Wikipedia -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anchor_baby )

"A child born in the US is a US citizen, but the immigration benefits to the parents are extremely limited. After the alien mother (or father) has been present for no less than ten years, the alien may apply for Cancellation of Removal (aka “Cancellation”) if she can prove ten years of good moral character and that deporting her would be an exceptional and extremely unusual hardship to her US citizen child. This is an unusual form of relief as there is an annual cap of 4000 on the number of illegal immigrants who can be granted Cancellation, and for the past several years the government has not reached that cap. This means that under 4000 people are granted this type of Cancellation annually." ( "The Anchor Baby Myth" -- http://www.scottimmigration.net/AnchorBaby.pdf )

It's notable that the Liberty Net is using the Web to get the word out but the Web also provides a quick way to fact-check any claims heard during their weekly gatherings.

So why did the LibNetters set up a Stickam site?

For years the Liberty Net has dealt with the problems of poor reception conditions and jammers. Heard mainly on the east coast, the net in the 75 meter band usually starts at 10 PM Saturday (Eastern Time) and spills over into early Sunday morning. Picking up the transmissions from various parts of the county is problematic with a shortwave radio: reception is all in the lap of the propagation gods. The LN member who operates the Stickam site picks up the SW transmissions on his ham receiver and then streams the conversations online in clear audio.

But even when reception is favorable other radio operators who don't care for the "Liberty Nutters" will jam the frequency with Morse code transmissions, noise, loud music, whatever. Stickam provides a way to work around the jammers: participants can now phone in through Skype and share their thoughts. So while a ham may be jammed on the air, callers still can voice their opinions online without interference (well, until the hackers show up).

I've been following the Liberty Net for years to track the latest news in conspiracy theories (Illuminati, New World Order, etc.). But I'm not a fan. I disagree with most of their ideas, especially stupid statements like drowning anchor babies. Sometimes even I feel like blocking their speech.

But ploys like jamming actually make the problem worse. If you can't hear someone, you can't comment on his opinions. Burying unpopular views doesn't kill them off. I'm a fan of free speech. Getting things out in the open.

And getting the facts right.

2011-10-08T02:06:00.004-04:00

Paragliding Spam

During the dawn of the American space program astronauts didn't have it easy. Sometimes they called themselves "spam in the can," referring to the tight quarters inside the early capsules and also the lack of control they had over the vehicles.

This was way before the days of the space shuttle. Instead of gliding to a landing like a plane after a mission, the astronauts just fell into the ocean, the fall slowed down by parachutes. A whole Navy fleet would search for the floating capsule and then it would be fished out. Predicting where the capsule would land wasn't an exact science with the early missions.

Until I picked up an old book the other day, I didn't know that there was a plan to return the Gemini astronauts hang-glider style. Flipping through the slightly musty pages of America's Race For The Moon: The New York Times Story of Project Apollo (1962) I spotted an illustration for a proposed capsule design that would allow it to return home on land.

Apparently NASA was hoping to use a paragliding parachute so that the capsule could glide through the sky, landing on a dry lake bed like the shuttle would years later. Skids would be added so that the ungainly-shaped capsule could land in proper fashion.

Doing some online research I found a YouTube video that explained that dummy models were tried out but the design was too challenging, there wasn't enough time to perfect it. Caught up in the space race -- "Gotta beat those damn Commies to the moon!" -- the project was soon abandoned.

So it can be truthfully said that a Gemini astronaut never left skid marks on a bed.

And within the pages of the same book I spotted a photo of President John F. Kennedy giving a speech in front of an early mock-up for a lunar excursion vehicle. To me that LEM looks like a Martian tool shed from a 1950s EC comic book.

With the end of the space shuttle program -- it didn't save money as promised with its re-usable orbiter -- NASA is returning to the capsule design, this time with a bit more elbow room for the spam aboard.

2011-10-08T01:56:00.004-04:00

V Is For Victory – For The Vatican

It’s all over.

On April 16, 2008 – a day that will live in infamy – Pope Benedict declared military victory over the United States of America.

Or so says Tom Friess, host of the program Inquisition Update heard on domestic shortwave radio station WWCR. I was dialing around when I encountered his program. Tom warned that millions of Catholics were ready to obey any command from the Pope, a fifth column within our midst.

I’m an ex-Catholic. Fortunately, I was never molested by a priest or a nun. But when I was an impressionable boy, the Roman Cultic Church did lay on the fear and guilt. In one catechism class a nun told us that when nuclear war erupted, an atomic bomb would open up a pit into hell. And unless we young sheep confessed our sins, we would fall into that pit, burning for eternity. A burn from a hot stove, she explained in vivid detail, was nothing like the ever-frying flames of hell.

And people wonder why I’m a devout atheist.

So while I have no great love for the RCC, I don’t buy into anyone out there who equates the Pope with the Anti-Christ or the Whore of Babylon. It’s the same Mega-Conspiracy scam: take some unpleasant facts about a particular group or organization – CIA, FBI, US Army, the Vatican, whatever – and use them as proof of a great plot to enslave the world. What appear to be just a few bad deeds by certain individuals is more than that. Those deeds are really evidence of a vast conspiracy lurking in the shadows.

According to Friess’s Website, http://inquisitionupdate.org/, President Bush held a special ceremony on the south lawn of the White House during the Pope’s visit to the US back in 2008. Friess claims that all sorts of symbolism – apparent to those fifth columnist Catholics – during the ceremony reveals the truth.

For example, Pope Benedict was given a 21-gun birthday salute. Explains Friess: “21 gun salutes honor military victors. The Pope is the military victor of this country.”

He also notes the Knights of Columbus – the RC answer to the Freemasons – was standing side by side with the US Army. Ergo, the KoC and the Army are equals under the Pope. This is what I call hyperlogic. If I happen to be standing next to a pregnant woman when a photo is taken, then that proves I’m the father of her child.

Friess states that if such symbolism was apparent to the non-Catholic American public, another Protestant Reformation would result and the US “just might have a fighting chance.”

Anyway, since the Pope is now the Big Cheese, what has he done lately? Is he plotting action against the Israeli Lobby? Will “knighted” assassins wearing funny caped suits and plumed hats eliminate all threats to the Vatican? And instead of worrying about women using burqas to conceal weapons, should we be careful around uniformed nuns?

The mind boggles.

Sources:

Vatican take over of America officially April 16 2008
http://inquisitionupdate.org/research/vaticantakeover.html

Rapturous welcome and 21-gun birthday salute for Pope in the U.S.
The Daily Mail April 17, 2008 http://bit.ly/oh8Na2

2011-10-08T01:55:00.000-04:00

Psychic Children: Reality Or Just Reality TV?

I’m a 360 skeptic: I’m skeptical about everything, including professional skeptics.

So I don’t rule out the possibility that on rare occasions a few people might experience some sort of psychic phenomena. Recently I watched a documentary series that purported to show actual psychic kids dealing with their powers. While I’m never had any special metaphysical powers, I can understand how these kids feel like outsiders due to the talents they have – or think they have.

The problem with “reality” TV is that it has to be entertaining. Sometimes the psychic kids series went over the line for me, using special editing techniques like quick cuts to heighten the suspense. And if the producers could goose certain scenes through such effects, what else did they goose?

I’m not saying the producers were deceptive but I’ve heard about others whose psychic talents were wanting at times: they couldn’t consistently produce the startling results and so sometimes they cheated.

As I watched the series, I wondered what was edited out. After all, who says the producer didn’t leave on the cutting room floor any scenes of mistakes, failures to perform? Sorry, but I need a more objective documentary that isn’t concerned with pumping the ratings.

Infotainment doesn’t cut it for me. Especially “reality” TV.

2011-09-29T04:45:00.003-04:00

Charles Hickson And The Nutzoid

Charles Hickson passed away on September 9th; he was 80 years old. If you're not familiar with the name, way back in 1973 (October 11, 1973 to be eXact) he claimed to be abducted by weird robotic aliens.

The story was that Hickson and a friend from work (Calvin Parker) were fishing from a pier near Pascagoula Mississippi when an UFO suddenly appeared and strange floating creatures exited from the craft. Each one was roughly humanoid in shape but with wrinkled elephantine skin, pointy nose and ears, and clawed-hands. The strange beings grabbed the two men and levitated them inside the alien vessel for examination. Then the aliens floated the two men back to the pier, releasing them, and then the otherwordly visitors left as quickly as they had arrived.

In a state of shock the men went to the local sheriff's office and told their incredible story. The word got out and soon Hickson and his friend were the focus of media attention.

I remember seeing Charles Hickson on TV some time later after his abduction. Dick Cavett had a late night talk show on ABC and one program was devoted to the topic of UFOs. (One source says the program was broadcast in November 1973, another states January 1974). My memory is a somewhat fuzzy but if I recall correctly Hickson was interviewed separately by Cavett.

There was a flap going on in 1973. Other guests included Colonel Lawrence Coyne who also told his own amazing story, an incident that occurred over Mansfield Ohio on October 18, 1973. Coyne and three other men in the Army Reserves were flying in a helicopter when an UFO appeared. Using a green beam the UFO dragged the helicopter around for a while and then released it.

All the guests sounded rational except for one. Of course a nutzoid has to show up and push his personal crazy beliefs. The nutzoid stated that UFO stories couldn't be believed, that you needed a thousand people to witness such events for them to be real. Gee, really. So if only 999 people see something, then it never happened? And on the flip side, what about mass hysteria?

Like I said, my memory is a bit fuzzy and I've been searching for a copy of that Cavett UFO program to make sure I have my details straight. But I do remember thinking that Hickson sounded more rational than the nutzoid. Astronaut James McDivitt, who had seen an unknown object while in space, was also involved in the discussion. He told the nutzoid he was being too scientific.

And who was the nutzoid?

Carl Sagan.

2011-09-16T06:20:00.004-04:00

Men And The Monsters They (Allegedly) Made

Man, the Freemasons can't catch a break.

Almost every conspiracy theory smears the Masons with some sort of shadowy evil. In the book, Man-Made Monsters by Dr. Bob Curran (2011), that apparently harmless fraternal order is tied in with the artifical creation of life.

What kind of life? Take a look at the book's sub-title: A Field Guide to Golems, Patchwork Soldiers, Homunculi, and Other Created Creatures. So we're not talking about cute little beings like Smurfs or Teletubbies.

The author doesn't buy in to all the negative stories told about the Freemasons, especially the one that says the Masons inherited the secret of artificial life from the Knights Templar. Dr. Curran only describes the tales, questionable records and urban legends he encountered when researching his work. The book is categorized as Paranormal/Mythology which the emphasis on the mythology part.

Back in year 1119 the Templars were founded in the Holy Land just after the First Crusade. Apparently this military monastic order uncovered buried artifacts and documents from the Temple of Solomon, objects with mystical power such as scrolls written by Melchezidek, the legendary priest king of Salem. It was whispered the Templars used this power to create homunculi that they worshipped.

The reason for such stories is that some wanted the Templars destroyed. The Order was involved in early banking and amassed a great fortune. Besides religious enemies, such as rival orders, the Templars also had secular enemies, monarchs greatly in debt to them.

When a new pope came to power, there was an opportunity to portray the Templars as secret practitioners of witchcraft and other satanic acts. The order was accused of creating homunculi to act as spies, thieves and assassins. Under torture some Templars confessed to evil but improbable acts.

So what happened to the creatures created by the Templars?

Conspiracy theories surround Berenger Sauniere, the priest of Rennes-le-Chateua in Southern France who officially served from 1885 to 1909. Somehow this priest had access to all sorts of money, building many projects around the village. What was the source of his wealth?

Dr. Curran relates the tale that Sauniere found a Templar homunculus within his church and he sold it to the Vatican for a tidy sum. The creature is hidden somewhere in the Vatican.

And the Templars' mystical knowledge? 400 years after the downfall of the Templars the Freemasons rose to power, learning the secrets of Solomon's Temple, or so says the legend. The Masons kept the secrets in various lodges throughout the world. Dr. Curran observes:

"Hints and directions leading to such secrets were to be found not in hidden texts, but in the geometry and symmetry of Masonic building and ornamentation, and throughout the years here have been attempts by non-Masons to decode these and to discover what these supposed 'secrets' might be."

As far as I know no non-Mason has cracked the code.

But the Freemasons aren't the only secret society that is tied in with conspiracy and man-made monsters. Dr. Curran mentions rumors about Rosicrucianism, that some modern-day followers are secretly working for the government in stem-cell and cloning projects.

I don't think the government needs Rosicrucians on the payroll to create monsters. It does a fine job on its own.

2011-09-12T04:11:00.000-04:00

Another Adventure With The Computer Printer From Hell

Envelopes.

That should be easy. Just call up your address list on the computer and then have the laser printer do the rest.

I follow the directions in the user's manual, opening the front feed panel and adjusting the guides to the width of an envelope. I also made sure to open the back panel where the envelope will pop out, addressed.

OK, the envelope goes through but it comes out crinkled. Check the manual. Gee, I forgot to release the two green tabs in the back panel opening, dropping down a long piece of plastic into a new position that supposedly will stop the wrinkling. So I release the green tabs, one on each side.

No go. The error button comes on. Printer won't print. Hit the magic green Go button seven times. No go. Invoke the eldritch name of Cthulhu seven times. No go. Tap the ruby slippers together seven times? Forget it. I flip the plastic piece inside the rear opening back into place and the error light goes off.

Check the manual in case there another way to keep envelopes crinkle-free. It mentions that I should go to a office supply store and spend money on either special envelopes or labels compatible with the printer. I bet those options are SO inexpensive.

In the end I found a quicker, cheaper and more efficient way to address envelopes. (No green tabs have to be released for this method.)

Get the address list and write out the addresses with a pen.

2011-09-12T03:22:00.006-04:00

Texe Marrs: Space Cowboy Calls Out The Illuminati

Is Satan Jewish?

That's the impression I get after listening to a recent shortwave radio broadcast by Texe Marrs, the host of Power of Prophecy. I remember Texe (that's his name; Google it) from years ago when I started my zine, back when I covered the SW conspiracy beat. But after a while Texe and the others on WWCR started to repeat themselves.

I happened to come across the Power of Prophecy program when Texe announced that this was the most important broadcast he has ever made. He mentioned the Illuminati.

OK, it was a quiet Sunday night, nothing on the boob tube to watch, so I decided to spend an hour with Texe so see if he had another new angle on the Mega-Conspiracy. And since it was September 11th -- well, I don't have to explain that to you, unless you've been in a coma under a rock for the last ten years.

From his HQ in Austin, Texas, Texe sends out his warnings through his Power of Prophecy Ministries about the Illuminati, baiting them. I'm surprised that they haven't taken him out like Lee Harvey Oswald or Howard Beale but Texe does have God on his side.

From the biography at his Website, it mentions that Texe is a retired USAF career officer who commanded communications-electronics and engineering units. He has also taught various subjects including international affairs, political science, and aerospace studies at three different universities.

Texe has what I call a space cowboy style. He's way out there man, shooting away at the bad guys. If you in tune late, you would think he was talking about some fictional parallel Earth in another part of the galaxy, but after a while you realize he's actually talking about this world. Why watch a TV show like Star Trek or Fringe when the real world (albeit Texe's real world) is full of incredible happenings?

Take the symbolism of the twin towers at the World Trade Center. Based upon his biblical research Texe said they represented the two central pillars that Samson pushed apart, causing the temple to collapse. Of course, the fall of the towers was caused by explosives planted inside each structure. Yup, Texe is one of those 9/11 Truthers but one into the Samson story. (He never did completely tie in the story with the inside job that made the towers collapse; he only provided a hair's-breadth connection.)

Maybe my memory is failing as I grow older but I don't remember listening to Texe years ago with the concept of the "elite Jewish conspiracy" bandied about so much. But this program did have that focus. Texe warned that the super wealthy Jews were behind the Mega-Conspiracy, the Illuminati. And who's behind that? Satan, of course.

The Satanic/Illuminoid/Jewish conspiracy plans to eliminate all religions until only one remains. Guess which one? Your guess is Church of the Sub-Genius? Hey, pal, you don't listen to WWCR that much.

Sources:

Power of Prophecy hosted by Texe Marrs. Broadcast on WWCR radio, 4.840 MHz, 9/11/11, 10 PM Eastern Time (0200 UTC, 9/12/11).

About Texe Marrs
http://www.texemarrs.com/atm.htm

2011-09-08T05:55:00.005-04:00

Zine Zap: Grunted Warning

"No jail for ham attack"

"Banana fear put straight"

"Penis taken in evidence"

Actual headlines from actual articles collected by zine editor Stuart Stratu in Down, Under AKA Australia. Grunted Warning is a gritty digest-sized pub (8 1/2 by 11 inch pages folded lengthways and stapled into a booklet) with a quirky quickly-pasted lay out, photos and news clippings chopped and then thrown together. The rough design adds to the rough quality of the subject matter. For example, "With S&M a scar is born," an article about two Czech porn producers who put a few actors in the hospital with their sado-masochistic production. (Ouch.)

But don't get the impression that GW is all about sexual perversion and scandal. Check out "Giant rats kill babies" and "Rats ground Qantas flight." Or the clipping about the Russian scientist who thinks ET contact will occur in a couple of decades. (Based on what? Strong Russian vodka?)

You can contact Stuart at PO Box 35, Marrickville NSW, 2204, Australia for a copy of Grunted Warning. He accepts a $1.00, stamps (AUS -- that's Australia, not Austria), trade, friendly letter or unusual clippings.

2011-09-07T21:37:00.004-04:00

Budd Hopkins: An Era Ends?

My only regret at this point in my life are that there is not a larger pool of qualified people willing to continue this challenging work, despite the many lives that have been helped along the way, and despite the massive amount of intriguing data that have already been accumulated. -- Budd Hopkins, New York February, 2011

[Photo of Budd Hopkins: www.intrudersfoundation.org/inside.html ]

Does the death of Budd Hopkins signal a turning point in alien abduction research?

Without any formal degree in counseling -- he was first known as an artist -- Hopkins helped people who thought they have been abducted by aliens. He always faced criticism for his abduction research. One critic was his ex-wife Carol Rainey who wrote a revealing article in Paratopia magazine (January 2011). In "The Priests of High Strangeness" she portrayed her ex-husband as someone both gullible and also willing to overlook certain facts to make his case.

In turn Hopkins wrote a rebuttal to Rainey's article entitled "Deconstructing the Debunkers: A Response." The above quote is the last line in his essay.

Of course those who still believe in Budd's work regard Rainey's essay as distortions and disinfo while most skeptics are happy to see what they regard as his dubious methods being challenged by someone who was an insider.

Whatever the truth is with the she said/he said controversy, some damage has been done to Hopkins' image. Another abduction researcher, David Jacobs, a friend of Hopkins, has been dealing with criticism from one of his subjects who calls herself "Emma Woods." With the death of John Mack back in 2004, it seems that the alien abduction field has taken some severe hits.

In her "High Priests" essay Rainey states the biggest problem with the field is that the same story keeps repeating itself. Nothing new has happened. People are abducted, probed, extracted, and then returned home.

It's like reviewing typical UFO reports. After a while they all blend in together. I know when reading a series of cases my eyes get blurry, my mind wanders. Nothing new has happened. No solid evidence. The source behind the mystery never reveals itself.

But despite the repetition and inconclusiveness with UFOs, the topic is still argued and debated. There are still followers and believers. And with alien abduction research, even though it lost a leading light like Hopkins, it will probably keep rolling along like astrology, ESP and all sorts of other New Age ideas, right or wrong.

Sources:

"Deconstructing the Debunkers: A Response" by Budd Hopkins
http://www.intrudersfoundation.org/Deconstruct.html

"The Priest of High Strangeness" by Carol Rainey
http://www.paratopia.org/paratopia_magazine/mag_preview_final.pdf

2011-09-07T21:33:00.003-04:00

Secret Of The Green Go Button

They love to screw you for money.

Especially with computer printers.

I gave up wasting time with inkjet printers. I don't print that much that often which means the cartridge openings dry out and plug up. To clean them to have to use more ink (meaning more money). And sometimes no matter what you do, a cartridge stays plugged.

The color inkjet cartridges are usually the ones that dry out. Print out a color photo and find it ruined with a purple overtone; the yellow ain't working. I gave up on the whole rip off when I couldn't get a cartridge to work, one half-full of overpriced ink. I decided that I would save money by printing my color images at a digital photo kiosk found at department or drug stores.

For black and white printing I decided to go with a laser printer which is nothing more than a photocopier hooked up to a computer. I bought a low-price home unit made by the Brother Corporation. The cost per page was supposed to be much less than an inkjet. The salesman told me that if the toner cartridge seemed to be empty, you could get more pages by taking it out, shaking it to loosen up the powder, and then re-installing it. I already knew that trick from selling photocopiers back years ago when I was an office equipment salesman.

So when the light came on the other day -- TONER EMPTY -- I did the shake-and-reinstall trick. Nothing. The printer wouldn't print.

I was pissed off because I knew I hadn't printed that many pages. The toner still had life in it. Print quality was still OK before the unit stopped.

After a few nugatory results with shaking-and-reinstallation, I checked the user's manual, finding the section about extending the cartridge's life. Under Troubleshooting: Improving the print quality, details on how to shake and re-install but no mention of the Go button.

I went online and did a Google search. I came across complaints from customers that the toner cartridges didn't last as long as advertised. Eventually I found the secret to making the unit work longer thanks to an user's comment: Press the green "Go" button after re-installing. Make sure to press it seven times.

Presto. The printer now works.

So why does the Go button have to be pressed seven times? Why not two or three? Maybe an engineer at the Brother Corporation was into numerology.

Regarding the user's manual, maybe someone forgot to add the detail about the Go button under Troubleshooting. Plain incompetence.

Or maybe the option for completely using up the toner was made arcane to increase profit margins. Whatever reason, customers are unhappy because they have to replace the cartridges too soon. What is needed is a smart competitor won't play such games and win customers over to its product.

In the meantime...

Fuck you, Brother.

2011-09-03T05:10:00.003-04:00

Notes Of A Distraught Woman

[Blue woman image based upon photo by Peter Delory. From the cover of Living With Your Husband's Secret Wars by Marsha Means.]

I'm a single male atheist. So why did I pick up a self-help book intended for Christian wives with marital problems?

The notes.

I found the book in a cardboard box on the sidewalk, buried in a jumble of other titles. The FREE BOX sometimes offers intriguing works that the used book store tosses out, not seeing any value.

Apparently the woman who purchased the self-help book didn't want it either, even though she marked it up with her handwritten notes, personal reactions to points raised by the author. It was an opportunity to glimpse into the mind of a devout Christian seeking answers through her faith.

From what I gathered the note-writer was upset that her husband was cheating on her -- mentally, not physically. He enjoyed pornography.

Yes, even thinking about sin is a sin. That's what they told me when I was brought up as a Catholic. It didn't surprise me to see that claim years later after I had "lapsed" from the church. I worked nights as a part-time janitor at a Catholic high school. In one room there was a poster with a list of points and warnings, telling the young students how to look and act. A key point: As soon as an impure thought enters your mind, put it out of your mind -- as soon as you think it. Or you'll have committed sin.

(The poster also said male students had to be clean-shaven, hair cut short. The nun principal didn't like me because I had a beard. I worked for a contract cleaner, not the school per se, so there was nothing she could do even though she believed that only Jesus and the saints were entitled to facial hair.)

I didn't agree with the premise that thought = sin but it was obvious the note-writer was hurt that her husband enjoyed porn and the fantasies that went with it.

She had listed on the inside back cover terms she equated with pornography. Besides "sexual sin," she considered porn as "adultery/infidelity," "extramarital sexual activity," "breach of vows," "sex addiction," "self-destructive behavior," and "sickness of the soul."

The note-writer also underlined and checkmarked many passages in the text. In one section an upset wife tells her story, relating how her attitude, anger, didn't change towards her unfaithful husband; it was sinful. The note-writer observed in the margin: "My unmoving attitude is sin!" Once again, bad thoughts are sin.

But the note-writer didn't always agree with the points raised in the book. One expert stated that forgiving a sinner too quickly can make the other person an enabler, continuing a cycle of forgiveness followed by more betrayal. Observed the note-writer: "Not always -- forgiveness is what gave me the courage and determination to change."

In another section the author states that the wayward husband has to show responsibility, remorse, and spiritual growth as part of the reunion process. But the note-writer remarked: "I see none of these. I see denial, lies, deception and an empty heart." On another page she wrote: "I still feel that there are secrets, not exposed to the light." Elsewhere I came across the word ANGER, emphasized with a circle, almost carved into the margin with her pen.

At one point the note-writer has a list of things she wants to say to her husband -- what she appreciates about him, what she needs from him, and finally, a request to pray together.

Towards the end of the book her notes suddenly stop. Like a used textbook that a college student dutifully marks up and highlights until he reaches the point where he is distracted by campus life or decides the course is bullshit.

In a number of places the letters PRSG are written in the margins, referring to peer recovery support group. Maybe through such a group the note-writer found some answers and that's why she no longer needed the book, no longer compelled to pen her thoughts in the margins.

2011-08-29T04:05:00.003-04:00

Enslave The World The High Tech Antichrist Way

Greetings, my friend. Have you ever thought about conquering the world?

ThanX to my research that goal is closer than you think. Part of the answer lies in the "non-fiction" book, 2000 A.D. -- Are You Ready?, by the propheteers Peter and Paul Lalonde. Even though it was published in 1997 and the world didn't end in the year 2000, this work provides clues to how to establish yourself as world dictator.

The book is subtitled How New Technologies and Lightning-Fast Changes are Opening the Door for Satan and His Plan for the End of the World. Yes, this is a born-again Christian book involving the Rapture, the rise of the Antichrist, and the return of the Messiah, but one with a high tech angle.

Oh, you don't believe in either God or Satan? A minor detail. Despite their Christian intentions, the Lalonde brothers have unintentionally sketched a plan that can you make you the secular king of the world.

There are three main parts of the plan:

1. Mass communications, particularly TV.

2. Virtual reality.

3. People are stupid.

The Lalondes claim that the Antichrist will quickly rise to power thanks to TV. Besides enabling the rapid spread of news around the globe, TV has distorted our perception of reality. For example, popular entertainment like Star Trek has made the incredible credible. When Christians disappear across the globe, bodily raptured into heaven, the Antichrist will explain it away through teleportation technology, no supernaturalism involved. The Great Deceiver will say he used technology like Star Trek's transporter beam to put all Christians into a "holding tank" until a new world order is created, one where "no man has gone before."

And what reason does the Antichrist give to beaming the Christians away? The answer is found on page 56:

"The first thing he could tell the ones remaining is that the Christians have been holding the rest of the planet back. He could tell them they are ready for the next step of enlightenment, maybe even the next step of evolution, and now, with the Christians out of the way, there is nothing to stop them from discovering their destiny."

The Lalondes contend that some people have been conditioned by "the gospel of Star Trek," i.e., the future as envisioned by Gene Roddenberry, full of promise and hope thanks to scientific breakthroughs. Mankind will survive and evolve and meet other races in the universe.

Besides Star Trek, entertainment like The X-Files and ET has made the existence of aliens acceptable . So if an entity purporting to be from another world arrives via a spaceship one day, no one would doubt his story.

And don't forget all those reports of UFOs, another factor making the existence of aliens acceptable to many. The Lalondes note that Satan is called in the bible "the prince of the power of the air" (Eph. 2:2). The logic is inescapable: UFOs are seen in the air, Satan is the air power prince, ergo UFOs are Satanic.

To push their point, the Lalondes use a quote by UFO researcher Jacques Vallee in which he observes some UFO incidents are like demonic encounters. As far as I know, Vallee isn't a born-again Christian and his views don't involve the reality of Satan (only some sort of entities pretending to be demons), but that doesn't stop the Lalondes from suggesting that Vallee believes in the demonic UFO theory.

2000 A.D. kind of rambles a bit, talking about artificial intelligence and animatronics, even suggesting at one point that a pseudo-alien (a deception by the Antichrist) could appear and get the people of the world all in line. (Apparently the Lalondes saw that Outer Limits episode, Architects of Fear.)

Of course, the New Age crowd takes a few lumps from the Lalondes, portrayed as a group of dupes like the Star Trek Gospel gang. And since New Agers are into UFOs, they would also fall for the alien deception. Throw in virtual reality distorting everyone's perceptions and mankind would be conditioned for conquest. (This last part was based upon the Lalondes' prediction that most people would be plugged into VR machines by now. Obviously they over-anticipated that development.)

For anyone looking for the particulars about enslaving the world, 2000 A.D. falls short. The Lalondes suggest and infer but for the most part don't come out and say how it would go down exactly. In fact, they were cautious enough back in 1997 to hedge on the year 2000 being the marker for the end-time, mentioning that it might arrive a few years later. (It's now 2011 and counting...)

But, my friend, you're only interested in conquering mankind. Obviously, it doesn't matter if Satan doesn't exist, that the Antichrist is a fantasy. With all the Christians blindly believing in God and the Devil, it's obvious that anyone with the right technology can deceive them as well as those suckers into New Age woo or the gospel of Star Trek.

You could manipulate the Christians by letting them assume you're the Antichrist, staying one step ahead of them. They would be fighting you on the wrong terms. You wouldn't have to teleport them into holding tanks. In fact, no Rapture would make them doubt their beliefs.

And it would be easy to turn the Star Trekker/New Ager dupes against the Christians, saying that you, a benevolent being from another world, have been falsely accused of being the mythical Antichrist. Both groups would be too busy fighting each other to focus on you.

But how do you set up this situation? The devil is in the details. But I know how to pull it off after thinking about the Lalondes' ideas.

If you want the particulars, dear friend, please send all of your money to my bank account in Nigeria.

2011-08-15T02:35:00.003-04:00

High Klass Speculation

Sometimes my creative mind looks for new challenges and I start speculating, engaging in higher thought eXperiments.

So what happens after you die? Let's say your individuality still exists, moving on to The Other Side, after you shed your meat suit. OK, then what happens?

For those into reincarnation, karma is the belief that what happens during your lifetime will influence your existence when you return to this world. But what if karma does exist but there's no reincarnation back into the physical plane, that your choices while alive affect your existence on The Other Side? Your karma shapes the form you take after you pass on. In most cases such a spirit would have a humanlike appearance unless that person did something requiring atonement.

At this point the name of the late Philip Klass popped into my head. He was a journalist, editor of Aviation Week & Space Technology magazine and also a controversial UFO researcher. I never met him, he was probably a good person, but life -- and the afterlife -- at times isn't fair. Klass never met a UFO case he didn't like -- to debunk. Critics charged that his particular brand of scientific examination regarding aerial phenomena was overskeptical. His early theory was some sightings were nothing more than energy plasma that could be generated under certain conditions. For example, high tension power lines could create glowing fields, ball lightning kind of stuff.

So maybe when Klass awoke on the Other Side, he found himself paying a karmic debt for a while, trapped in the form of ball lightning. He would appear to other souls, glowing and whizzing around for a few moments before disappearing with a bang, only to return later on, repeating the process. Desperate to communicate with other spirits, he would try to control his temporary ball lightning appearance, hovering in place, flashing a message in Morse code: SOS. He would prove he was real, an unusual form controlled by intelligence.

But despite his attempts at reaching others, all the other spirits ignore him.

After all, on The Other Side, it's common knowledge that ball lightning doesn't exist.

2011-08-07T04:15:00.004-04:00

Liberty Net Versus Jamming Jamming

We're jamming
I wanna jam it with you,
We're jamming, jamming
And I hope you like jamming too --Bob Marley

Early Sunday morning. August 7, 2011. Tonight the weekly get-together of the ultra-right-ring Ham radio forum Liberty Forum was interrupted, according to one participant, by "a subhuman jammer."

One quickly picks up on "code words" when listening in to the Liberty Net forum. For years the superpatriots have been meeting in the 75 meter band on shortwave radio, starting their discussions around 10 PM Saturday Eastern Standard Time and running over into the next day. Their commentaries are also rebroadcast on the Web via streaming audio at http://www.stickam.com/thelibertynet .

How far to the right are these amateur radio operators? They think Rush Limbaugh is a puppet, a stooge. Some listeners disagree with LibNet viewpoints and they try to jam the net's frequency with strong Morse code signals, loud music, whatever they can find to make it difficult to follow the conversations. It's very illegal to do this, by the way. Ask the FCC.

I listen in to the LibNet gabfests to track the latest news in the sub-culture of conspiracy theories. For example, earlier in the discussion there was the topic of an US military helicopter shot down in Afghanistan and how it was probably another diabolical plot by the Mega-Conspiracy, AKA the New World Order, the Illuminati, etc.

Among the soldiers aboard the helicopter were 25 members of the Navy SEALs; all were all killed after the copter was hit by a RPG (Rocket Propelled Grenade) fired by the enemy, according to a TV newscast I heard before listening to the LibNet. The newscast also corrected earlier reports that stated the SEALs who died were the ones who participated in the attack and assassination of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan back in May. The deceased were only part of the same covert unit.

Apparently LibNetter Al Parker hadn't heard that update. He stated that the SEALs aboard the copter were the same ones who entered Pakistan and took out Osama bin Laden in his residential compound hideout. Parker thought the SEALs were shot down by "friendly fire," not in the sense of an accident but following a plan.

Parker said that the SEALs had the goods on President Barack Obama, that they knew the Osama raid was a sham. According to one conspiracy theory, the terrorist bin Laden had died years ago and the raid was a deception to help President Obama to juice up his public approval. Such are the ways of the evil Mega-Conspiracy.

But if this far-out theory is true, then the "friendlies" who shot down the copter also have something on Obama. So another special unit will have to terminate those "friendlies" with extreme prejudice. But then that unit will have the goods on Barack. And so someone will have to kill that third crew... I'm having trouble buying into this. Or maybe the logic behind it just escapes me.

LibNetter Al Parker, at least when I've heard him on the air, doesn't stoop to use slurs like "Hispanic nigger," a term someone else on the net used to describe the jammer. Parker uses terms like "subhuman" and "African" and "ghetto" to refer to certain individuals. Mealy-mouthed racism, anyone?

The jammer was rebroadcasting a FM radio station featuring global music. Parker did mention that the radio station had streaming audio on the Web. It seems that whoever was behind the interference didn't have to be connected to that station as an employee or even as regular listener. He was just re-pumping in the jamming tunes, mon. In fact, the jammer could even be one of those Americans of "white European stock" that Parker praises while condemning "subhumans."

The mysterious jammer picked a good choice in music to drive Parker off the air. Parker said such music made him sick, that it was destroying culture unlike classical music. He accused the jammer of being mentally defective, suffering from syphilis.

But there's a paradox about Parker and his "white" fixation. Parker is what is called A-albionic (A = Anti), i.e., he usually rants about the Royal Family of England being behind the Mega-Conspiracy. Seems to me the Royal Family is about as white as you're going to get. Or maybe I'm missing the logic.

2011-08-01T04:14:00.010-04:00

Planet Earth: Weapon Of War

To self-proclaimed independent scientist Lauren Moret it's all a conspiracy.

Hurricane Katrina (2005), the Haiti Earthquake (2010) and the earthquake-tsunami-nuclear meltdown triple disaster in Japan back in March -- not random events caused by impersonal natural forces. All were planned and executed by an international war crimes network involving the CIA, DOE, and BP for City of London bankers.

So how did evil agents within the Central Intelligence Agency, the (US) Department of Energy, and British Petroleum pull it off? According to Moret they simply moved heaven and earth with another initialized entity: HAARP.

The High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program located near Gakona, Alaska is described at its Website as "A Premier Facility for the Study of Ionospheric Physics and Radio Science." Its purpose is to improve military and civilian communication and navigation systems by learning more about the Earth's ionosphere. There are two major components to HAARP, one continuous, the other intermittent.

Scientific instruments study the geomagnetic environment and collect data, 24/7. Sometimes the researchers fire up a HF (high frequency) transmitter to poke around in the environment of near space. According to HAARP's Website FAQ page, the project is not classified, i.e., there are no classified documents pertaining to it. In fact it schedules Open Houses during the summer for anyone who wants a look-see inside.

It all sounds benign but not to conspiracy theorists like Moret. She claims that disasters like Hurricane Katrina, the Haiti earthquake and the recent Japan triple-disaster were all caused by HAARP. Apparently when the boys are firing up their HF transmitter in Alaska they're engaging in "tectonic warfare," creating earthquakes in targeted areas.

In the case of the Japan triple-disaster, the Fukushima nuclear power plant was specifically targeted to cause a meltdown as part of what she calls international genocidal depopulation. Not only the people of Japan are victims of the released radiation, says Moret, but also people in other parts of the worlds such as the US West Coast.

And what background does Moret have to make these claims? In her biography posted at exopolitics.com she states she has a BS in geology (U.C. Davis, 1968), a MA in Near Eastern Studies (U.C. Berkeley, 1978), and also has completed a PhD in Geosciences, ABD (all but dissertation) at U.C. Davis.

But as an independent scientist Moret isn't limited by her educational background. She's also familiar with meteorology -- actually, I should say weather control. She maintains that HAARP created a series of hurricanes in the United States after the Fukushima meltdown, manipulating Earth's natural forces to intensify the effects of the radiation drifting in from Japan.

And why is the evil cabal behind HAARP doing this? All for GOD: gold, oil, and drugs, its main sources of income. And it's not only the illegal drug market that financially empowers the cabal. Exposure to higher levels of radiation weakens people, causing disease, resulting in more dependence on big pharmaceutical companies, ergo, more profits. The ensuing depopulation means its easier for the conspirators to grab land and resources.

But what use are such grabs when the land and resources are too hot to use? Maybe Lauren Moret will provide an answer to that puzzler.

Additional Sources:

Leuren Moret: Fukushima HAARP nuclear attack by CIA, DOE, BP for London banks

Scientist Leuren Moret: Radiation war intensifies with HAARP tornadoes in USA

Coverup! California, Northwest, B.C. Canada under radiation as high as Japan

2011-07-31T22:16:00.001-04:00

A Pose By Any Other Name

Hugh Mungus?

I supposed to believe an article by Hugh Mungus?

I came across this writer's name over at ufodigest.com . Sorry, that name sounds too much like a joke. Even if it's his real name, I can't take anything written by him seriously. It requires a humongous leap of faith. What's next? A flying saucer report from Biggus Dickus?

There's the fringe newspaper, The Sovereign, that reads like The Onion on a bad hit of LSD. Check out its line-up of dubious bylines: Donald "Pogo" Meserlin, PE; Socrcha Faal; T. Weed; Putty; and even Death Dentist. And let's not overlook Sarah Conner, Human Resistance Leader, and Nick Fury of S.H.I.E.L.D. Fiction comes to life? I don't think so.

Trust is important when it comes to appearances. And you can trust me or my name isn't Ray X.

2011-07-31T04:07:00.002-04:00

80 Years Old And Still Saucering

He's been there from the beginning, back in the days when the buzzword was flying saucers, not UFOs. He's been involved both in ufology -- documenting strange cases but also exposing hoaxers -- and ufoology -- perpetrating a few hoaxes of his own. A combination of believer, skeptic and trickster all rolled into one.

Jim Moseley will be 80 years old on August 4th. Note to UFO researchers: better interview Jim now or before you know it, time will fly by and the opportunity will be lost.

Best wishes, cards, money can be sent to him at PO Box 1709, Key West, Florida 33041. You can email him at saucer_smear@yahoo.com -- indirectly, that is. He has an associate editor that will pass along your messages. Jim eschews the digital revolution, especially what he calls the Dreaded Net. I suspect he doesn't trust all the alien tech given to us from the Roswell Crash. That's why he still puts together each issue of his non-scheduled zine, Saucer Smear, with a typewriter, scissors and tape.

But Jim isn't a complete Luddite; he has a phone: (305) 294-2270. Call if you suspect he isn't real. I know I call on occasion just to make sure he exists. In fact, considering his energy and rebelliousness, 80 years young would be a better description.

Happy Birthday, Jim.

2011-07-15T21:07:00.003-04:00

Publish Or Privish

Privish. A word formed from "privately published."

In a negative sense it means a strategy by a book publisher to sabotage the release of a controversial book. For example, the book "DuPont: Behind the Nylon Curtain" by Gerard Colby was privished after a DuPont family member raised a stink after seeing an advanced copy of the book. Due to pressure, the publisher Prentice-Hall cut the number of copies for distribution and slashed the advertising budget.

In a neutral or positive sense privish can also mean a choice by a writer to limit distribution of printed works to very few people. The advantage of this type of privishing is that is only shared with readers who are really interested in the work, not its format or status.

Some people consider this type of privishing in a negative light because it implies that the members of the writer's inner circle won't criticize the writing. I don't mind criticism if it's constructive and practical.

So when it comes to my words on paper, call me Ray X, Privisher.

ADDENDUM: 8/14/11

I decided to have my own take on privish. In my case it's going to mean "privileged publishing." Privish in the sense of private publishing is pronounced "prie-vish." Privish with my new definition is pronounced "priv-ish." So those still receiving my paper zine should feel privileged -- all two of you. [G]

2011-07-14T04:14:00.000-04:00

Zine Or Blog: Why The Great Divide?

There was another issue I wanted to discuss in my last post but decided that it warranted its own entry.

My bastard hybrid zine.

I started as a paper zinester and over the years I find myself a blogger first, then a zinester. I think some people are upset that my zine has become a collection of my blog posts.

Why do I think that? Well, when a zinester says that paper should never reproduce photons, that online and offline writing must be separate, I kinda notice.

I also notice when a zinester states that he will never put email and web addresses in his paper publication; he only deals with snail mail.

Each to his own but...

Why does it have to be one or the other? It seems a creator has to declare his allegiance to either the paper brigade or the digital legion, nothing in-between.

In fact, some of the paper types act as if the Web is evil incarnate, destroying their dead tree way of life. Years ago there was one zinester who warned to stay away from the Internet because it was an opportunity for "They" to spy and track you. As if no one ever sneaks a peak at snail mail or taps a phone.

Some zinesters act as if the Web lobby is going to outlaw snail mail and paper. "They'll have to take my rebuilt mimeograph machine from my cold dead hands!" That sort of thing.

I know there must be online counterparts to the paper only crowd, people who think that everything should be digital, proclaiming death to all traditional physical formats. I don't buy that hyper-logic either. I do like books, magazines, newspapers, zines.

I do a fair amount of surfing and so far I haven't encountered any digital elitists. But I have encountered a few meatspace ones in the zines I've read.

This zine-or-blog controversy -- screw it.

When it comes to writing, the medium ain't the message.

And if you're getting bored like I am with this zine talk, don't worry. Because when it comes to zining, I'm through worrying at all.

2011-07-11T02:32:00.002-04:00

Ray X Violates Key Zinester Commandment!

I have broken one of the sacred commandments of print zinesterdom:

THOU SHALL NOT CHARGE MORE THAN ONE DOLLAR FOR A ZINE THAT RUNS EIGHT PAGES OR LESS

I became aware of this vile transgression through Randy Robbins of Narcolepsy Press Review. He wrote a review of my zine, Ray X X-Rayer (#80), mentioning that it comes out "pretty regularly" and that the last issue feature images of crucified Santas on the cover, a layout he thought was "cool." Then he goes on why he has a problem with the latest issue.

At this point I thought he would write about the contents of #80, why he didn't care for my articles. After all, a review should at least give the reader a brief lowdown on what subjects the writor covers, his POV and style. If I was reviewing Narco I would summarize what is included besides short zine takes.

But I'm here to review a review. Most of Randy's words regarding XR #80 isn't the contents and my opinions but the new price for my zine:

"But with this issue I couldn't believe what I was reading. The last bit about how he's now charging for the zine and he deserves two bucks for his work and worse, that it'll just end soon anyway, just came off not cool. So if you never ordered it when it was free, now that's it two bucks, how about it?"

Ray X not cool? Horrors. What will the hipsters say?

(I hope Randy has a sense of humor.)

In a note he included with his zine Randy warned me with "Not the best review this time around." OK, some people don't like my writing. Fine. But Randy's focus was on my on $2.00 charge per issue. He advised me that I could only charge that for a 16 page zine.

My reply: Quality over quantity. I've received zines that were packed with pages -- mostly unreadable pages, content and print standards. Not worth a buck. My zine ain't slick but it's readable and some readers find it interesting.

And as I tried to eXplain before, I have limited time, money and energy. Blogging is very efficient, minimal cost. I have creative projects besides this Ray X gig, especially after six months of winter around here, being cooped up in this shoe box apartment. (That's why I haven't been blogging that much lately.)

I'd rather be doing other things than prepping a print zine and getting it out in the mail. (Sorry to repeat myself, regular readers of my genius.) I'd rather be researching and writing, not sorting, folding, stamping pieces of paper.

And don't take that last line as a put down of print zines. I like print zines. I'm just not into running a charitable operation while doing one. Once again, budget constraints.

I can live with a bad review for my zine but a bad bad review? It was like reading a movie critic's take on a film and all he does is complain about the price of the ticket to get in and says next to nothing about the movie's plot or theme.

In his note Randy wrote that he was "disheartened to read my cynical words" regarding the price for my zine. Sorry, Randy, I think my words are practical, not cynical.

I do things my own way. Maybe some think that I'm the Joe Eszterhas of zinedom, that all I want is top dollar. Look at my blog. No charge. I'm giving enough away for free as it is.

$2.00 for my print zine? Live with it.

[NOTE: Despite the bad bad review I received, Narcolepsy Press Review #7 is worth a couple of bucks. Send well-concealed cash to Randy Robbins, PO Box 17131, Anaheim, CA 92817-7131 .]

[NOTE: I've been told blog posts should never run over 500 words. This one clocks in over 650. Another vile transgression!]

2011-06-22T03:47:00.000-04:00

Monotony, Uncertainty and Eschatology

With all of this talk of doomsday -- Harold Camping resetting the date to October 21st and there's also the buzz about 2012 -- I wonder what drives some people to embrace the End Times whether they be Christian or New Age.

I think a few individuals want release from the monotony of daily living, the constant grind of working and making ends meet. They want some excitement, an escape from the deadly boredom. Stuck on a treadmill they question the purpose of life.

And while there's monotony, there also lurks uncertainty. Something bad could happen at any moment -- a car accident, a murder, a natural catastrophe. Some people want to jump to the end of the book and know how it all wraps up, no surprises.

Especially when it comes to the big question: Is there life after death? And more importantly, will I be rewarded for my struggles?

That's why when someone comes along and says, "Here's the date and good things will come your way if you believe," suckers are ready to line up.

2011-05-26T02:46:00.001-04:00

Camping It Up Again

It's the "I was almost right" argument.

May 21st, 2011 -- Judgment Day. A good person would be raptured up to heaven, eternal salvation, but an unsaved one would simply perish, his consciousness wiped away forever.

Instead of the whole world falling apart at the same time, May 21st would be a methodical doomsday, step by step. Starting at the international dateline, each time zone would experience great earthquakes at 6 PM local time.

Or so claimed Family Radio President Harold Camping who sat at home on that fateful day, waiting for news from the other side of the world about God's judgment marching along the globe, each time zone a falling domino.

Then nothing happened.

So Camping went into seclusion while some of his followers were pissed off, including the ones that spent their own money to spread the world about doomsday through such outlets as billboards, books, and even a lit sign on top of a car.

But Camping is back. He says he was wrong -- sorta. You see he looked over his calculations and decided he was off by five months. Be assured that the world will end on October 21st.

And what about his May 21st prediction? Camping says he was almost right. That day was a spiritual Judgment Day that placed all of us under Christ's judgment. Hey, is that fair? Shouldn't there have been a mystical sign on that day? We can't just take Camping's word for it. In 1994 his first doomsday prediction didn't come to pass. Note to God: Get a better messenger.

So May 21st was Judgment Day in a sense. Doomsday is still a'coming.

This bit sounded familiar to me. So I checked and I was right.

Ladies and Gentlemen, let's travel back to 19th Century and meet the Millerites. They were the followers of William Miller who prophesied the world was going to end sometime between March 21st, 1843 and March 21st, 1844. (What is it about the 21st of the month that lends itself to an End Times date?) But nothing happened, especially on the latter date.

So a new date was determined: April 18th, 1844. More nothing. So the Millerites decided that they had entered a "tarrying time," that is, a time of waiting for Christ to come down from the clouds.

Then a Millerite preacher named Samuel J. Snow did his calculations and Shazam! -- doomsday was going to hit on October 22nd, 1844. Guess what happened? Clue: that date is known as the Great Disappointment.

Three strikes, you're out.

But ye of little faith -- please listen. According to one group of Millerites something did happen on October 21st, 1844. Miller's prophecy was based on a line from the bible, Daniel 8:14-8:14:

"And he answered him,* ‘For two thousand three hundred evenings and mornings; then the sanctuary shall be restored to its rightful state.’ "

The sanctuary was assumed to be the Earth and the restoration was a cleansing. But that assumption was in error, said this group of Millerites. The cleansing was done in heaven. (Gee, I didn't know that heaven could get so untidy and dirty. Oxymoron: pigsty heaven.) From this group grew a new movement, the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

So history repeats itself. "Tarrying time," "heavenly cleansing," and now "spiritual Judgment Day." The common denominator: all three have to be taken on faith.

Or be taken with a strong dose of cognitive dissonance.

2011-05-16T01:51:00.005-04:00

Will You Survive The Camping Trip?

Mark your calendar. May 21st, 2011.

It's the end of the world.

If you're a good Christian, raptured to heaven you will go. As for the rest of us, we're screwed.

So says Harold Camping, President of Family Radio, a Christian broadcasting service heard throughout the world via shortwave radio. I wrote about his prediction back in 2009 [ http://xrayer.blogspot.com/2009/03/camping-trip-end-is-near-again-as.html ]. I almost forgot that the hour was nigh. (Sin is so distracting.)

How can Camping declare the world will end when it's stated in the Bible that no one will be tipped off about when Final Judgment is going to hit?

This point is raised at the Family Radio Website:

"No one except God knows the time of the end of the world. How does anyone dare to teach that the Rapture and the Day of Judgment will occur on May 21, 2011? Doesn’t the Bible say very plainly that no one can know the day or the hour of Christ’s return? Indeed the Bible did teach that. "

But there is an out for someone like Harold Camping. As he notes:

"Therefore, regardless of how brilliant or how learned a theologian or Bible student might have been, or how diligently they studied the Bible or faithfully served Christ, it was impossible to learn from the Bible the timetable for the end of the world. Anyone who claimed he knew the time of the end was always wrong.

"Nevertheless, there is a very striking statement in the Bible. It is recorded in Ecclesiastes 8:5. There God declares:

"'Whoso keepeth the commandment shall feel no evil thing: and a wise man’s heart discerneth [better translation: will know] both time and judgment.'

"In the Bible a wise man is a true believer, to whom God has given a profound trust in the authority of the Bible. True believers have been in existence since the beginning of time. But the timeline of history as it is revealed in the Bible was never revealed to the hearts of the true believers. For example, throughout most of the church age it was generally believed that Creation occurred in the year 4004 B.C.

"However, about 35 years ago God began to open the true believers’ understanding of the timeline of history..."

From this point Camping uses "logical" reasoning -- or as I call it, hyperlogic -- to say that the situation has changed, a wise man (Camping) has new knowledge revealed by God that allows one to now see the hidden messages in the Bible pertaining to the timeline of creation and destruction. The "That was then, this is now" argument.

As Camping explains:

"Therefore, whatever end-time information had been given to Daniel, but was not to be understood until the time of the end, had to have been included in the Bible before the Bible was completed. However, God wrote it in such a way that it could not be understood until the world was almost at its end."

Camping bases his claims on all sorts of historical calculations, assuming that certain events went down at certain times, and then uses what I call hypermath to prove his statement about the quickly approaching last day.

So what will happen on the last day of life as we know it?

On a Web page called "FACTS about May 21, 2011" Camping says a great earthquake -- of biblical proportions, of course -- will shake the world, opening up all the graves. The remains of the faithful will be transformed into spiritual bodies while those of the unsaved will be thrown to the ground to be shamed. And what about the living? Camping states:

"The inhabitants who survive this terrible earthquake will exist in a world of horror and chaos beyond description. Each day people will die until October 21, 2011 when God will completely destroy this earth and its surviving inhabitants."

Apparently the living good souls get beamed up to the Starship Enterprise -- oops, I mean heaven. As for the unsaved, we don't get tossed into the eternal fires of Satan's Spa; instead, we just lose consciousness when we die during the horror and chaos, just snuffed out (Camping believes in the Christian belief of annihilationism).

As a hippie would say: "Man, what a far out trip!"

Keep in mind that Camping predicted The End was going to happen in 1994 in one of his books. But he explains that people overlooked an important part of the book's title: "1994?" -- the stress on the "?" (Yup, don't forget that weasely question mark.) Also, once again using the "That was then, this is now" argument, Camping says when he wrote his book certain important biblical knowledge remained unknown.

Of course, in one way Camping could be right. If he happens to die that day, the world will end -- for him.

= = =

Sources:

Family Radio Website:
http://www.familyradio.com/index2.html

No Man Knows The Day Or Hour?
http://www.familyradio.com/graphical/literature/nomanknows/nmndh.pdf

FACTS about May 21, 2011
http://www.familyradio.com/facts/

Harold Camping
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Camping

2011-05-13T14:32:00.002-04:00

JFK's Far Out Affair

Did President John F. Kennedy engage in extramarital extraterrestrial sex?

If the story is true, then it was one small shtup for a man, one giant shtup for mankind.

According to backwards voice analyst Jon Kelly, President Kennedy made an unconscious slip during his last press conference. By reversing and digitizing a key statement made by JFK, Kelly claims there's evidence that JFK had sexual intercourse with an ET, either as a contactee or as an abductee. In an excerpt of his video presentation (see link below) Kelly notes that JFK was known for his many affairs, including movie star Marilyn Monroe who was a presidential mistress.

Kelly can tease out unconscious messages through his backwards speech analysis to reveal hidden truths. In the video excerpt the reversed words of JFK seem to say: "He had sex with an alien."

How doe Kelly find these hidden messages? In an Internet radio interview with "Insights for the Soul" he states:

"I was someone who had a background in yoga and understood the yoga philosophy about the human voice and its impact on unconscious processes, and I applied that in this technologically-enabled field where we use computers to digitize the voice, find samples that have provocative influence on unconscious processes, helping people to access and resolve deep issues."

From that quote I gather that Kelly looks for "samples," parts of a reversed recording that sound like human speech. If that's the case -- sampling -- then it could be argued that with any reversed speech if you listen to long enough you might encounter something that seems to be a hidden message. I wonder what the ratio is with usable versus unusable material. Does he have to plow through a lot of noise to find a short signal?

Here's an excerpt from his appearance on the "Insights" program where he presents two examples of hidden messages:

With this process he has discovered hidden messages with other US presidents. I would like to know more about his research with JFK and the alien sexual encounter but it costs $4.95 to view Kelly's online program, "President Kennedy's Secret UFO Messages Revealed." Sorry, my research budget is too lean lately to dig further.

Kelly also uses backwards voice analysis for therapeutic purposes through his clinical services. He records a client on the phone (with permission, of course) and then shares his findings. A private telephone session includes a 10 minute interview and voice analysis with detailed interpretation plus an audio copy of the session to download. Only $120 through PayPal.

If you want to listen and see how his therapy works, the "Insights for the Soul" program linked below includes his analysis of a phone recording with a co-host of the show.

As for me, this backwards talk has revived some memories for me. I'm going to dig out my dusty LPs and listen to all those backmasked satanic messages buried in the vinyl grooves.

= = =

Sources:

"Insights for the Soul" with Guest Jon Kelly
http://bit.ly/jDBUdN

Video excerpt: President's 'alien affair' leaked in secret on new TV show
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bu-qLJ2gpts

Jon Kelly - home page:
http://www.yourinnervoice.com/

2011-05-08T00:21:00.002-04:00

Time Travel Validated Obama's Destiny

During his 2008 campaign Barack Obama didn't have to worry about being elected to the presidency of the United States. It was a done deal, time-traveling government agents told him.

According to researcher Alfred Lambremont Webre (see links below) the president belongs to a third generation CIA family. Someone else under the control of the CIA. Ho-hum.

But what makes this CIA-connected conspiracy stand out is that the Agency has access to quantum access time travel. According to Webre and a whistle blower named Andrew D. Basiago (link below), a highly-classified operation called Project Pegasus allows the government to probe into the space-time continuum, using Tesla technology to teleport someone into the past or future or to somewhere like Mars.

Basiago claims that as a young child in the 1970's he served as a Project Pegasus chrononaut. Future presidents -- both Bushes and Bill Clinton -- had been "pre-identified" through time travel probes. He says that in 1982 Barack Obama was aware that one day he would sit in the White House thanks to pre-identification information provided by the government.

This time travel talk bugs me. Look at how the government screws up stuff at times thanks to boobs in its employ. It has time travel and hasn't made any major mistakes to reveal that secret like cavemen suddenly wandering around Times Square, clubbing people over the head?

And why tell a presidential candidate that his election is in the bag? Wouldn't that make the candidate question the existence of free will? I could see Obama resent being nothing more than a puppet of destiny, compelled to try fighting the future.

Unless he's being controlled by a microchip implanted in his brain...

= = =

Sources:

"Hidden story behind Jesse Ventura & Piers Morgan’s CNN clash over Obama CIA ties" By Alfred Lambremont Webre April 18th, 2011 10:10 am PT
http://www.examiner.com/exopolitics-in-seattle/hidden-story-behind-jesse-ventura-piers-morgan-s-cnn-clash-over-obama-cia-ties

"Investigative reporter: Newly released Obama birth certificate forensic forgery" By Alfred Lambremont Webre April 29th, 2011 6:45 pm PT
http://www.examiner.com/exopolitics-in-seattle/washington-times-report-newly-released-obama-birth-certificate-forensic-forgery#ixzz1LimxrBg4

"CLASSIFIED US Government time travel 'quantum access' capability REVEALED by government whistleblower" Monday, 18 April 2011 20:12
http://trentslist.org/trents-blog/69-announcements/338-classified-us-government-time-travel-qquantum-accessq-capability-revealed-by-government-whistleblower

http://www.projectpegasus.net/

2011-04-05T01:48:00.001-04:00

XR #80

Finally. My paperzine, Ray X X-Rayer #80, is in the mail. I had to make a special visit to the Post Office to send off a couple of overseas requests, one to Australia, the other to the Netherlands. Airmail postage wasn't as bad as I had eXpected.

For those who tuned in late, my zine is only available via snail mail. I no longer put up free copies (PDF) on my Website. After I made that decision, a fan in Australia told me he was printing out the PDF editions but still wanted to trade zines via snail mail. This was the only feedback I've received over the years regarding my online zine editions. Unless I hear an uproar from other online readers -- who still can access my blog for free -- my decision stands.

Sometimes the Internet/papernet split is annoying. I prefer photons over paper when it comes to writing but I still read a lot of stuff on dead trees. Some meatspace zinesters don't like the Web. Fine by me. For those zinesters I've decided to only review or discuss their publications on paper. This means that while most of my zine consists of posts from this blog, there are a couple of new articles. I'm now pricing my zine at $2.00 (US funds, bills only). It's a basic format, B&W, 8.5 x 11 sheets, corner-stapled, 6 pages. Is it worth two bucks to get a couple of short articles not available on the Web? That's your call.

If you think it's worth it, mail your carefully concealed cash to BoXholder, PO Box 2, Plattsburgh, NY 12901-0002. Mention XR #80.

I do accept trades with other zinesters but selectively. Sorry but I prefer not to send free zines to prisoners. I can imagine the prison mailcheckers/censors toss my work in the trash, deeming it unacceptable.

Now with all those envelopes stuffed, stamped and mailed, I can return to what I really enjoy, research and blogging.

2011-03-30T05:25:00.004-04:00

Space Cadets And The Starship Enterprise

James T. Kirk, captain of the USS Starship Enterprise, and his team drop in on the planet Mythra, a world settled eons ago by humans who fled the planet Earth. Beaming down via transporter, Kirk & Co. materialize in a public square but the inhabitants are unimpressed. The Mythrans just walk by, a "silly happy look on their faces."

This scene seems typical of any Star Trek adventure during the original run of the TV series. Except this adventure takes place in the pages of the book, Mission to Horatius, a novel for young readers by Mack Reynolds with illustrations by Sparky Moore (1968, Western Publishing Company). Not a bad story; it's in the same style of the TV show. Nothing unusual until I find out why Mythrans have silly happy expressions. They've been dosed with anodyne, a local form of LSD.

Let Dr. McCoy, the Enterprise's doctor, explain:

"I would have to analyze it further in my laboratory on the ship; however, this drink contains a very effective hallucinogen, related, I suspect, to was one called lysergic acid diethylamide, or LSD-twenty-five, on Earth. Its use in the Federation has long been discontinued, even by medical authorities."

The anodyne is described as poison. OK, this is a book for young readers back in the days where weirdo hippies wanted to be put LSD in your breakfast cereal (or so claimed the right-wing conservatives of the day). What's interesting in light of the CIA and its MK-Ultra experiments -- unknown by the public at large back in 1968 -- the anodyne is used as a form of mind control by the ruling Mythran priesthood.

And one of the away team, Ensign Chekov, drank some. He's happy to hand over his weapon to the enemy. A Sparky Moore illustration shows Chekov tripping away, unlike the rest of Kirk & Co.

There's a medical subplot in Mission to Horatius: Doctor McCoy is very concerned about the Enterprise crew being in space too long, confined within the ship. He's worried that a condition called cafard is starting to grip the crew. According to Science Officer Spock, cafard results from "the instinctive dread of a species, born on a planet surface, of living outside its native environment" compounded with claustrophobia and boredom.

I think to myself: Hey, why not give the crew some anodyne? Not a daily dose that the Mythran priesthood requires of its followers. Oops, that won't fly, not in this story. Drugs are bad, always bad. (Later in the Star Trek franchise, a device called the holodeck is introduced, a virtual reality created by realistic holograms. Tripping not chemically but through high tech.)

At this point in the book I'm reminded of the great blow up between the producers of the first Star Trek TV series and Hardon Ellison over the script for the episode, City on the Edge of Forever.

In this story the Enterprise discovers a space-time portal on the surface of a barren planet. McCoy is accidentally injected with a drug, becomes delusional, and he ends up going through the portal into Earth's past. Kirk and Spock have to go after him because he's somehow screwed up the timeline; the Enterprise no longer exists.

The producers had a number of issues with Ellison's first and second treatments for City of the Edge of Forever, mainly budgetary constraints and the script being delivered so late. One point the producers wanted changed was the involvement of "two drug-crazed, deranged characters." In the original treatment the person who causes the chronal screw-up isn't McCoy but a drug-dealer aboard the Enterprise who flees into the portal. The producers didn't want any such deviants among the clean cut starship crew.

This incident is recounted in the book Inside Star Trek: The Real Story, coauthored by the producers Herbert S. Solow and Robert H. Justman (1996, Pocket Books). Even though Ellison revised his script, the producers found it still to expensive to shoot and it was eventually re-written by four other writers, including Gene Roddenberry, the creator of Star Trek.

Of course, egocentric Hardon Ellison -- a man hard on himself and everyone else -- ended up in a serious dispute with Roddenberry. Maybe Ellison needed a dose of anodyne to put a silly happy face on his mug.

But despite its difficult birth City of the Edge of Forever is a ST classic, even with the deletion of two deranged druggie characters.

While the onscreen side of Star Trek remained drug-free, it wasn't the same off screen, at least for the series creator.

On pages 374-375 of Inside Star Trek it's mentioned that Roddenberry took pills to stay awake while doing rewrites and later he graduated to "the use of other mood-altering substances." Roddenberry liked to roll his own funny cigarettes.

Producer Justman had a problem with Roddenberry's drug use, especially in light of the fact was Roddenberry was an ex-cop.

But what's so surprising that a cop or an ex-cop feels entitled to break the law? Isn't such cutting corners one of the benefits of being a law-enforcement officer?

One time I read an letter to the editor in a local newspaper from a ST fan who was upset that a writer portrayed Trekkies/Trekkers as space cadets. That was a smear, said the fan, not true. There was no real connection between drug use and being a ST fan.

And while most of the people involved in Star Trek don't fit the stoner stereotype, it's ironical that its creator -- a man who wanted no drug-dealers on his starship -- fell far short of the ideal Starfleet hero.

Or maybe Roddenberry should be forgiven. He could've been suffering from a severe bout of space cafard.

2011-03-27T23:21:00.001-04:00

Moseley, Nazca Lines and the Cosmic Balance

Was Jim Moseley the first to make the connection?

A while ago I was talking telephonically (not telepathically) with Jim, editor of Saucer Smear, about an article he wrote for my blog dealing with the Nazca lines in Peru. Back in the 1950s he visited that area and formulated the theory that the lines were evidence of mankind's contact with beings beyond this world, a theory he shared in Fate magazine.

I asked him if he was the one who originated the idea, years before Erich Von Daniken came on the scene. Jim, who at times can be humble, declined to make that statement.

At some point I was going to dig into the matter via Google but I never got around to it.

Recently Jim sent me a copy of a snail mail letter from an online reader, a Curt Collins of Jackson, MS, who did the research, proving that Jim is indeed the first to publicly propose the theory. Collins cites an entry from the Skeptic's Dictionary site that James W. Moseley originated the idea in his article in the October 1955 issue of Fate magazine. Collins mentions that other online citations can be found.

Jim is amused by this because he no longer believes the Nazca lines are patterns on a ET landing area.

As these things work out, Von Daniken took Jim's idea, ran with it, and made a good chunk of change with books like Chariots of the Gods. But Jim plugs away in relatively obscurity, no bestseller books footing his bills, putting out his UFO zine, Saucer Smear, a labor of love, not money. If you want to compensate for this gross cosmic imbalance, send two dollars (US bills) to James Moseley, PO Box 1709, Key West, FL 33041 for a sample copy of Smear. After all, Jim makes more sense that Von Daniken with 90 per cent less BS.

Support cosmic balance.

2011-03-25T02:30:00.002-04:00

Vortex Or Void

On Dec. 21st, 2012 at 11:11 Universal Time "UFO Lawyer" Peter Gersten will take a leap of faith from a towering summit in Sedona, Arizona. He will enter an interdimensional portal to elsewhere -- or not.

It's a somewhat complicated story about how Gersten came to this decision. At his Website -- 11:11 Invitation 2012 -- he explains how the symbolism of 11:11 took on sudden importance in his life. In October 1998 Gersten noticed that 11:11 and its variations (1111, 111,11) kept popping up at different times and places, more than any other number combination, with digital devices and even with other shapes and forms. He wondered about the significance of these events.

On the Internet some people learned that they were not alone, others were also seeing 11:11 in a special context. For example, when someone happened to check his digital watch, the time would be 11:11, the number occurring more than random chance. Seeing that number would cause a strange sensation, a sense of something greater than mere coincidence.

From this a concept grew that there was a mystical connection, that the 11:11 phenomena was part of enlightenment and spiritual ascension. After spending most of his life dealing with the practicalities of law, it seems Gersten had no problem embracing this New Age belief despite the lack of solid evidence.

Then again, Gersten in one way wasn't a practical lawyer. A legal practitioner since 1970, he ended up with the nickname of UFO Lawyer because of his interest in uncovering the truth about aerial phenomena. From 1997 to 2000 he represented different UFO groups, filing FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) requests to gain access to records held by various governmental agencies.

He was also involved in the personal injury lawsuit filed by Betty Cash, Vicky and Colby Landrum who claimed there were exposed to radiation during an UFO encounter in the Texas countryside one night in December 1980. The UFO was shaped like an upright diamond, spewing flame and heat from its bottom opening. Many military helicopters were in the area. The implication of the Cash-Landrum case was the device was an out-of-control government experiment. The case was dismissed because the plaintiffs couldn't prove their story.

I wonder if the outcome of that case was a key factor in the formation of Gersten's 11:11 WS (winter solstice) 2012 belief. After all, his clients had health issues and if the US government was indeed responsible, then seeing it escape any responsibility would sour one's world view, creating a need for some sort of positive validation to existence. Just speculation on my part.

One key influence that Gersten does share is a scene from the made-for-TV adaptation of Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles. Gersten didn't have a chance to watch the entire series when it originally ran (January 1980) but four years ago he viewed it on videotape. He describes the mini-series as poor and boring. No argument there.

In the series people from Earth are settling Mars which has a generally terran climate and atmosphere. It's suspected that Martians -- who supposedly died out eons before -- still lurk about. Gersten at his site shares a clip from the series that had a great impact on his life. In the scene a religious leader, Father Peregrine, wants to prove that the Martians are still alive. Three glowing globes approach him in the barren wilderness. To prove they are real, he leaps from the cliff and before he hits the ground, one of the globes saves him.

To Gersten this was the only gem in the entire muck of the miniseries. He was so affected by that scene he replayed it again and again. Despite the poor quality of the clip at his site, it's obvious the scene is shot in a location with red cliffs and summits. Looks familiar. Like photos I've seen of Sedona, Arizona.

The summit where Gersten plans his leap of faith is Bell Rock, so called because it's roughly shaped like a bell. Bell Rock and other areas in Sedona are known for "vortexes," places of increased earth energies that can raise self-awareness and promote healing. To Gersten this all ties in, vortexes, 11:11 symbolism, winter solstice 2012. Apparently he believes that some sort of super-vortex will occur. transporting him through an interdimensional doorway to the galactic center and Eternity.

Will he be leaping into a higher reality -- or just into the black unknown?

2011-03-20T19:04:00.001-04:00

No More Free Zine

I open up the envelope. A few dollar bills, another request for my zine.

It dawns on me: Why am I giving away my zine for free online? Why am I bothering to convert the file into a PDF and going through the process of uploading to my Web site, then not even seeing one comment for my effort?

Everyone reads my blog for free. I don't make a dime. There are no ads on my blog. Costs are negligible when it comes to distribution. A blog is efficient, easy.

But my paper zine involves paper, ink, envelopes, stamps -- it costs. Plus time, printing and collating copies, addressing and stamping envelopes, etc. In no way is meatspace zine publishing as efficient and easy as blogging.

No more free zine. No longer will I upload each edition as a PDF so that anyone can print it out. Starting with the next issue, if someone wants a copy, they can send me $2.00 cash (US bills, no coin). As before The Ray X X-Rayer will essentially be a collection of my blog posts, some articles revised and updated, sometimes with a little new material slanted towards the papernet audience, all in a basic 8 1/2 by 11 corner-stapled format.

If someone misses the PDF editions, you're still free to collect and print out my blog posts for your own personal non-commercial use.

I deserve some compensation for all the work I do for both the blog and the zine. This isn't a get rich scheme (there's a laugh) but just a way of defraying some of my eXpenses.

And if this doesn't work -- hey, no more zine.

2011-03-13T05:51:00.007-04:00

Radio Clip: Jewish Nazis

OK, no progress on my zine. I've been working on other projeX. I've been digitizing audio recordings on tape. And the tapes I'm digitizing are VHS.

Yes, I made audio recordings on VHS tape. Why? Well, back in the old days, you could record with a cassette tape but the best you could do was 45 minutes per side. Yes, there were 120 minute blank tapes, one hour each side, but they had a tendency to break or jam.

So when I wanted to record an hour-long program or longer on radio, I would hook up the audio jack on the VCR to the radio and left the video going. If I eliminated the visual part the recording would screw up, the VCR would go crazy. Actually the video part is helpful, making it easier to locate audio sections I want to digitize, especially with fast-forward/rewind searching.

I wanted to share a couple of audio clips here at my blog and so I'm been trying to use the editing program Audacity. It works OK -- when this damn computer works right. Sometimes Audacity won't allow me to click certain options or I have to restart the computer when the program freezes up.

I won't bore you with all the details but I want to point out that all of this takes time, locating the particular recording I want to digitize, connecting a VCR up to my computer with a special USB hook-up, converting the video to audio only, and then editing down the audio to a clip for sharing.

To add to the time suck, Blogger won't let me upload audio files so I have to throw up a visual title card to create a fake video that it will allow (in case you're wondering why the same image is burning itself into your screen).

This clip dates from way back to 1994 when I was promoting my new zine. Back then the big thing was domestic US shortwave radio, programs like Bill Cooper's The Hour of the Time and Texe Mars' World of Prophecy. Some broadcasts were live and callers were welcome to join in. Most of the superpatriot programs were on WWCR in Nashville, Tennessee, a station still known for its ultra-right-wing Christian line-up. (Some joke that WWCR is short for World Wide Conspiracy Radio).

One program I used to tune in was the Kurt Saxon Radio Show. I didn't agree with everything Kurt said; sometimes there seemed to be a subtle tinge of racism in his comments. But he was a character who belonged to all sorts of groups from the American Nazi Party to Scientology. He could tell a good story. Kurt's schtick was into being prepared for the approaching collapse of civilization -- within in two or three years. (Funny how that turned out, even with Y2K.)

In this clip -- according to my records is dated 7/17/94 -- I'm talking on the phone with Kurt about Jewish Nazis and his days as a member of the Nazi Party.

The audio quality is fair at best. It's SW radio, after all. At times reception conditions on shortwave are challenging, if not impossible.

2011-03-03T21:16:00.000-05:00

eXperiment

I might be trying something different with my blog and blogzine this time around -- depending upon your reaction.

To eliminate duplication of effort, I will write my zine first instead of collecting a few posts from this blog. When the issue is finished, I will put a link here so that you can read it as a PDF file at my Web site.

That means no posts on this blog for a while but at the same time you can read the zine in one sitting, even print it out if you want.

Comments about this will be appreciated.

2011-02-12T02:32:00.003-05:00

XR #79

If you're looking for the latest PDF version of my print zine, you'll have to go to my new Website: https://sites.google.com/site/rayxzone/ . You have the option of viewing the issue online or downloading it to read later.

Why a new site? Simple. It's easier to use than the other one I had; I don't have to use Sea Monkey Composer and play around with HTML just to upload and archive issues. Older issues of the Ray X X-Rayer are still available at http://xrayer.com . At some point I might combine both sites into one, using the xrayer.com URL to re-direct to the new site.

Saving time by using a Google site means more time to research and create new articles.

2011-02-09T02:11:00.000-05:00

BANG!

That sound? Me slamming my fist down on my desk while trying to print out the last issue of my print zine.

With the Rube Goldberg interface of computers and the Web, you would think publishing online would be a bigger chore than printing out a few paper copies. Wrong.

Thanks, Hewlett Packard.

Before purchasing a HP inkjet printer I had other three other such printers, an Epson and a couple of Applewriters. I had some problems with those units but nothing like this HP.

The last issue of my print zine had a number of images. I tried to render them with decent quality but failed -- actually, the printer failed. There's nothing I enjoy more than grayscale images coming out with streaks, especially color streaks. Like a little light pink with that B&W photo?

Double-sided printing is supposed to save paper, i.e., each side of a sheet is used. 8 pages are printed with 4 sheets. But you won't save paper if the printer keeps getting hung up, printing out of sequence.

So next time draft mode, one-sided printing. If that's not good enough, go to my site where PDF files of my zine are stored and print your own.

And don't mention getting a laser printer. I don't have the money and I've used a HP one which also sucked. A HP printer trying to properly communicate with a computer is worse than a computer interfacing with the Internet.

I could go back to trekking to the print shop and doing my issues there but I prefer at-home DIY to save time.

A while ago a subscriber summed it up this way in regards to my efforts to publish a good quality zine:

"I don't care what it looks like as long as I can read it."

So why should I bother?

BANG!

That sound? Another nail being pounded into the coffin for my print zine. I haven't given up, but with HP ripping me off with overpriced ink cartridges and a printer that uses ink like shit through a goose, don't be surprised if my print zine ceases publication.

2011-02-02T20:01:00.002-05:00

17 Years Later: Dead In Winter

I know the correct phrase is "dead of winter" -- meaning the midpoint of the season when the greatest misery is suffered -- but today dead in winter is a more apt term.

Today is February 2, Groundhog Day. Of course a major storm has hit this area, the northeastern corner of New York State, AKA the tundra. Most places are closed; nowhere to go. If it's not massive amounts of snow, the deep freeze temps confine one to his warm den.

Back in February 1994 I started my zine, Ray X X-Rayer, to have something to do during the long bitterly-cold nights. I don't have the eXact date when I conceived the first issue so I've decided to celebrate the birthday of RX XR on Groundhog Day. And why not? It's a goofy day that uses myth to predict the future, the great unknown, in this case how long winter will last.

I already know the answer. This is indeed the middle of winter. Some of the worse snowstorms hit in March. April can see more snow and even May on some occasions isn't spared from the dreaded white stuff. Six months of winter, anyone?

So at this point I am dead in winter -- well, let's day half-alive. I'm not quite dead yet. I do have my moments of activity, creative bursts, but as a solar-powered being who tolerates too many overcast days, my energy is limited. Usually I respond to comments on my blog and also comment at the blogs I follow, but not lately. Just not enough energy.

But today I'm working on the latest issue of my zine and writing this post so I'm doing more than being dead asleep all the time.

The calendar on my wall: twelve months of tropical beach scenes. Why do I need snow scenes when I'm surrounded by that crap for about half of each year?

(Corrections made: 2/9/11.)

2011-01-23T00:29:00.006-05:00

Xmas Elf Mind Control

I was thinking about writing on this topic during the holiday season but I was too filled with the Christmas spirit.

(And if you believe that last statement, I have some real estate on the planet Krypton to sell to you.)

Apparently Santa by himself doesn't cut it with the kids anymore when parents try to keep their little bastards in line. Thus this product was created:

Year after year, children and adults alike are baffled by the mystery of how Santa really knows who’s been naughty or nice. After much urging by the elves and Mrs. Claus, Santa has allowed his biggest secret to be revealed in The Elf on the Shelf: A Christmas Tradition. Touted as “The best thing since The Night Before Christmas” this gift set includes a light skin, blue eyed North Pole pixie-elf, hardbound children’s book and keepsake box. Children can register their elf online and receive a special response from Santa.

That's the manufacturer's statement which can be found at Amazon.com . This book-doll combo is fiendishly clever. The book explains that Santa employs his own Stasi sprites to keep an eye on children all over the world. The doll is one of these watchers. At night the elf comes to life and flies to the North Pole to dish the latest dirt to Santa.

According to a local newspaper article, the manipulative parents move the elf doll to various locations around the house when the kids are asleep, thus giving the impression that the elf came alive and made his report. I can imagine what the stuffed snitch is reporting back to Satan -- I mean Santa. Probably ratting out Little Johnny who has been peeing with the seat down or turning in Little Jane who has been sneaking into her parent's bedroom and sticking pins in those funny wrapped balloons she found in the nightstand shelf.

A family with three children was profiled in the article. The Big Brother elf worked so well that one kid was eating new foods he wouldn't touch before. Hey, kid, do you really like those Brussels sprouts? Wait until you're older and just the smell of them makes you puke because you forced yourself to eat them to score more Xmas loot.

A friend of the family also bought the book-doll combo and "found it to be an effective behavioral tool." Behaviorism, anyone?

To quote:

Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select -- doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors. --John Watson, Behaviorism, 1930

The shelf elf also teaches young ones to rat out someone to the authorities, a brother telling on his sister to mom and dad. Let's stoke that sibling rivalry up a full notch. Let's also mold those impressionable minds to never question authority, to always do what is right, that is, "right" as defined by authority.

The doll also reinforces magical thinking: kids are told to talk to the elf to send along messages to Santa.

Wait until those kids grow up and find out that Santa -- and even God -- was all a big lie to keep them under control.

2011-01-13T02:27:00.004-05:00

Blackhawk Versus The Deadly Flying Disc

Back in the old days kids used to flock to the local cinema for the matinee serials featuring their favorite heroes. Each segment would end with a cliffhanger, for example, the hero is trapped inside a car that suddenly explodes. Is our hero dead?

Nope. When the fan returned to the theatre the following week, he would see the exploding car but this time an extra preceding scene would be included showing the hero leaping to safety before the car burst into flames and flew over a cliff.

An example of this hokum is the serial, Blackhawk: Fearless Champion of Justice, from 1952. Blackhawk was a popular character featured in Quality Comics during World War II who led his international team of brave aviators in strikes against the Nazis. After World War II Blackhawk relocated his base of operations from Europe to the USA where he continued to battle enemies of justice and freedom.

In this serial he's fighting a spy ring trying to get its hands on futuristic inventions created by American scientists. At one point the bad guys finally come up with a sci fi weapon of their own, a remote-controlled flying disc targeted at Blackhawk and his plane.

As you can see from the above image, special effects were on the crude side for this serial. Instead of a frightening device, the viewer is treated to a cute cartoon flying saucer. Wheee!

And how does Blackhawk manage to stop the deadly disc? Simple. He pulls out his handgun and shoots it down in mid-air.

Note in the above still capture that Blackhawk is aiming his gun out the window of the cockpit door but it appears the gun is still firing through the windshield. There must be a windshield because no air is blasting through, messing up Blackhawk's hair or blowing off his cap. So how can he fire through a window without shattering it? Bad low-budget production values? Naw. You see Blackhawk's special plane must have one-way superscience glass that keeps out the elements but allows bullets to pass harmless through in the opposite direction.

One device the spy gang is trying to steal is the electronic combustion ray. When Blackhawk meets the inventor, he looks at the ECR and says: "So this is the secret device that you have been secretly perfecting for the government."

Here's Blackhawk watching a secret demo of the secret weapon being secretly perfected in secret:

And how well does this device work? Well, if you have an old wooden chair you're too lazy to toss into the trash, check this out:

Previous to the demo the inventor explains that the secret secret is out about the device: he is being watched, he has received death threats. Blackhawk astutely observes:

"Evidently you have created something worth stealing."

The inventor says the weapon emits a ray that travels at three times the speed of light. That statement reminds me of this poem:

There was a young woman named Bright
Whose speed was much faster than light.
She set out one day
In a relative way,
And returned on the previous night.

So this weapon should destroy its target before the button is pressed. But we don't see that in this Blackhawk movie.

If there's anything I hate, it's bad superscience.

2011-01-01T01:38:00.003-05:00

GUEST BLOGGER JIM MOSELEY: THE NAZCA LINES

Jim Moseley has been around since the early days when UFOs were usually called "flying saucers." Besides being the author (with Karl Pflock) of the book, Shockingly Close to the Truth! Confessions of a Grave-Robbing Ufologist, he is also the slightly opinionated writer-editor of the world's longest-running UFO newsletter, Saucer Smear. (Longest running in the sense his newsletter has existed under various names such as Saucer News.) Jim can be reached via snail mail at PO Box 1709, Key West, FL 33041. A donation of two dollars (cash) will get you a copy of his gritty zine. You can (indirectly) contact him via email: saucer_smear@yahoo.com [link]. Please mention Ray X sent you. He enjoys name-droppers.

* * *

THE SOMEWHAT MYSTERIOUS NAZCA LINES OF PERU
by James W. Moseley

My friend "Ray X" has asked me to write a brief article about my personal experiences with these famous mystery lines on the coastal desert of Peru.

These incredibly straight lines, sometimes over a mile long, cover an area of a couple of hundred square miles. There are at least two man-made mounds where several lines converge, giving the impression that treasure might be buried there. There are also large animal figures laid out on the desert, among the lines.

The Nazca civilization, running from about 100 B.C. to 800 A.D., preceded the Inca empire. As a shameless treasure hunter, I have dug up many Nazca tombs containing beautiful pottery, wooden figures, and sometimes gold. It is known that the lines were made by this same ancient tribe.

The myth is that the Nazca lines were some sort of landing field for spaceships from other planets. Superficially they look a bit like a modern airport. The pattern can only be seen from the air, but after all these many years the lines are so faint that all the aerial photos I have seen are enhanced artificially to make the lines more visible.

There is no mystery whatever as to how the lines were made. The Nazca desert consists of a very shallow layer of small reddish rocks containing iron ore, and other similar rocks not much bigger than gravel. By going down less than half an inch you come upon pure white sand. You can take a wide broom and easily make a line for yourself, as incredible as this must sound. Your line, like the others, can last almost forever, because there is almost no wind or rain whatever in this area.

In the 1950s I spent a lot of time treasure hunting in Peru, and was quite successful. At that time there was a German archaeologist named Maria Reiche who studied the lines in infinite detail for many years. She wrote an uncopyrighted pamphlet available in English that was on sale in Peru. I edited it to suit myself, and published it under my name in America's FATE Magazine in 1955. Much later, along came Erich von Daniken and many other sensationalists who jazzed up the story for fun and profit, according to their own fantasies.

In 1956 or 1957 I, amazingly, obtained written permission from the local museum to dig for two weeks in the Nazca valley, including the nearby lines. I went with a small group of diggers to one of the above-mentioned mounds at the Intersections. I know of no one else who has ever done this. Unfortunately, we found absolutely nothing. The Nazca tombs are available elsewhere, as we knew.

It is clear that there is no mystery at all as to who made the lines, how they did it, and when they did it. The only question is in regards to why. Attempts to correlate the lines with bright stars and planets have proven unsuccessful for several reasons. The interplanetary theory is out. Recent archaeologists relate the lines to the eternal search for water on the desert, but this theory seems complicated and incomplete, from what I have read. Maria Reiche, for all her years of tirelessly mapping the lines, never found out why they were made. She died quite recently.

Now I'll tell you something of archaeological importance that I have never written about till now for various reasons. Before I had ever actually seen the lines myself, I was driving one day near Lima with two friends, on a dirt road across a desert very similar to the desert a couple of hundred miles away at Nazca.

There, running for perhaps a hundred yards through a tiny valley next to the road, was a line identical in appearance to the ones at Nazca. There may well have been others nearby that we didn't see. No Nazca pottery, etc., has ever been discovered near Lima, so the conclusion seems to be that other ancient tribes made lines like this for the same reason that the Nazca people did - whatever that reason may be.

You may wonder why I didn't publicize this discovery. Unfortunately, the line was in a little valley almost exactly like hundreds of others, and would be very hard to find again. By now, it is probably under a condo, as the city of Lima has grown tremendously in recent years.

My opinion is that there are plenty of genuine mysteries on this planet without the necessity of distorting a minor mystery like the Nazca lines. Immediately comes to mind a huge pre-Inca fortress near Cusco, the old Inca capital in the heart of the Peruvian Andes. It is called Sacsayhuaman, and is right next to the main road leading to Cusco. I have had my picture taken there, as have thousands of other tourists over the years.

The problem here is that Sacsayhuaman consists of huge boulders as heavy as one hundred tons each, piled on top of each other to make walls. Stone can't be carbon-dated, as far as I know; so no one is able to tell us who built this fortress, when, and how. Even the most modern machinery could not move stones as large as this!

Was Sacsayhuaman built by aliens who landed long ago at Nazca? Probably not...

2010-12-25T01:41:00.003-05:00

Google Keywords: Crucified Santa

2010-12-13T02:47:00.002-05:00

Solar Energy

As you may have noticed from a previous post I've been irritable lately. I've also been dealing with low energy levels. Besides the usual holiday bullshit, the weather has also been getting to me. Check out this five day forecast:

How can I deal with this? All that sunshine! I'll get sunburn.

2010-12-11T23:28:00.000-05:00

Updates At xrayer.com

The last two issues of my zine, Ray X X-Rayer #77 & #78, have been uploaded at my website, http://xrayer.com . Each zine is a collection of posts from this blog in PDF format; you can print them out for your own personal use. I also did some tweaking with the format, putting the issue links for each year in reverse chronological order, i.e., the latest edition is listed first.

2010-12-10T17:28:00.001-05:00

Too Short? Too Bad

I've received a couple of comments that my hardcopy - snail mail zine, the Ray X X-Rayer, is too short of a read.

Guess what. I ain't writing War And Peace.

My zine is a collection of posts from my blog. I slap it together when I feel like it. Sometimes it's only four pages, other times longer. Considering that I only charge a lousy dollar for it, it's not worth the time and effort to produce it, sort it, and then get it out in the mail. I would rather do all my writing online and leave all the meatspace bullshit behind.

If you find my paper zine is too short, then produce your own that meets your length requirements. You'll see how easy it is.

Anyway, zining is supposed to be about individual, independent expression.

2010-12-10T17:27:00.000-05:00

Googling The Gs

Two words, six letters. And a lot of frustration.

Throw in information overload and it's a big mess.

I had remembered reading somewhere about a FBI program that employed people from all walks of life to help out with surveilling a suspect. These employees were civil servants, not Special Agents, who looked like the average Joe or Jane. That was because they were the average Joe or Jane. The nickname for the program was the Gs. I thought the Great Search Engine Google could help me find the answer.

So I used keywords like "FBI" with "civilian spies" or "citizen spies" or "the Gs." Nothing. A dead end.

I dug out my copy of the book, The Spy Who Got Away (1988), by David Wise. This nonfiction work tells the story of Edward Lee Howard, a CIA agent who escaped to Moscow after passing US secrets to the Soviet Union. I checked the index and found under Federal Bureau of Investigation references to the Gs, the Special Support Group.

More Googling but no good hits. So I just went with abbreviations: FBI SSG. And then the answers were revealed -- not too many but something.

I was going to write about the Gs but I'm too Googled out to continue. Next time.

So when you're reading one of my posts, keep in mind that sometimes a lot of frustrating research is involved.

2010-11-29T03:49:00.001-05:00

What's Wrong With This Picture?

January 24, 1988.

Evening. Cloudy. A somewhat secluded road, a few houses around, far apart.

A pickup truck pulls over. The driver gets out. He walks down the road, shouting, daring someone to show themselves. His name is Ed Walters.

The passenger gets out, holding a video camera, taping the event. He is a newspaper editor who was contacted by Ed that a UFO might appear. His name is Duane Cook.

Cook has been following Ed's story for some time, a story involving the strange appearances of a UFO, aliens sending mysterious messages to Ed via telepathy. Ed is a contractor in Gulf Breeze, Florida, who claims he hears a humming sound inside his head before a UFO appears. As on other occasions, the humming starts low, then grows to such intensity that it becomes painful.

So why doesn't Cook think all of this is just in Ed's head?

Because Ed has submitted pictures to Cook's paper, images showing an otherworldly craft hanging in the night sky. The pictures were taken with a Polaroid camera. In pre-digital days the Polaroid system provided the closest thing to instant gratification. Other cameras used film that had to be exposed, then developed as negatives or slides. Negatives needed enlargers or automated machinery to make prints; slides required a special projector that cast images on a screen. Both processes involved a long turnaround time from taking the shots to viewing them.

A Polaroid camera combined the developing and printing into two simple steps. Snap a shot. The exposed small print would pop out from the camera. Wait sixty seconds for the development process do its magic and after you carefully peeled away the protective top layer, there was the image.

Cook believed that Ed's Polaroids were good evidence of UFO encounters because Polaroids were hard to manipulate to produce fakes.

As Ed keeps shouting at his alien tormenters, it starts to rain. Cook decides it's now too dark to keep shooting. As he starts to get back into the pickup, Ed yells, the UFO has appeared. Ed snaps a shot of the object, his camera's flash going off.

Cook isn't quick enough. By the time he gets out to take a look, the UFO has disappeared, or so Ed claims.

Ed hands the exposed print to Cook. The newspaperman waits sixty seconds and then pulls the protective layer off, revealing an alien craft hovering in the sky, the rooftop rack to Ed's truck illuminated by the camera's flash.

But Ed is upset. He wanted Cook to see the UFO but the aliens are playing hide and seek once again. But Cook isn't disappointed. He tells Ed: "It's more important that you shot it, and I saw you shoot it, and this is what I saw you shoot. This is better if I had seen it and you had not gotten the picture."

Cook adds: "I can flat out guarantee anybody that I saw you take this picture."

Wait a minute. Back it up. At this point in Ed Walter's book, The Gulf Breeze Sightings, I had a problem. (And not for the first time.)

It's stated in the book that Polaroids were hard to fake -- but it doesn't state that such fakery is impossible. With everything going on -- Ed's hysterics about the aliens tormenting him, the rainfall starting up, Cook getting back into the truck -- how can Cook definitely say that Ed gave him the same print that popped out of the camera at that time?

Cook states: "[Ed] came over to my door, pulled the photo from the camera, and handed it to me." (Page 340). Or so he recalls.

With everything happening Cook could have assumed that Ed pulled it from the camera. Under certain conditions perception and memory can play tricks. Maybe another print, one exposed using a special method, was substituted.

Misdirection is a standard trick for magicians. Look over there while I'm making a switch here. So is misperception: the magician influences what you think you see.

No, I'm not saying Ed Walters that evening was only doing a magic trick. But the possibility still exists. And considering that a model of the same UFO was found in Ed's home after he moved away, I find myself leaning towards the skeptical.

I argue that it would've been better if Cook saw the object and Ed didn't get the shot. A hovering UFO is harder to fake than a picture.

Previously in the book another man -- Bob Reid, a videographer for a local TV station -- one night has a similar experience to Cook. Reid is keeping watch over Ed, his mini-van and observation set-up a block away from Ed's house. The videographer and Ed keep in touch via walkie-talkies. Ed leaves his house, walking over to the van to deliver an item to be passed along to someone else. During part of the walk Reid can't see Ed; trees obstruct the view.

Suddenly Ed on the walkie-talkie asks Reid if he sees the UFO. But the videographer can't see the object at that moment because he is looking at the wrong spot in the sky, distracted by a plane. Ed soon shows up, agitated, asking Reid if he witnessed the ET craft during its brief appearance.

Once again another observer misses viewing the elusive alien ship. But Reid believes he has the evidence he needs: his recording of the Ed's distraught state is proof that Ed did see an alien craft, that he was in contact with aliens. After all, Ed's terror is so convincing. It couldn't just be his imagination.

Again, a problem. Certain people can completely convincing on videotape, even though their emotions are faked, reacting in fictional situations. They're called actors. Hollywood awards them for being so apparently real. Maybe Ed did have a terrifying experience but his reaction by itself proves nothing.

Both incidents and the responses by the observers of Ed's actions involve what I call hyper-logic. Whether you're a harden skeptic or a true believer, don't try to win me over with such "logic."

[Disclaimer: I read The Gulf Breeze Sightings years ago and this time I only perused parts of the book to refresh my memory. I didn't read it from cover to cover a second time. My life is too short. But note I did more than scan the index.]

Sources: All from The Gulf Breeze Sightings (1990) by Ed and Frances Walters.

Chapter: JANUARY 21, 1988--TWELFTH SIGHTING--WITH REID ACCOUNT; pages 140-147.

Chapter: JANUARY 24, 1988--THIRTEENTH SIGHTING --ENCOUNTER VIDEOTAPED BY COOK; pages 152 - 158.

Appendix 2, pages 337 - 341, Duane Cook's January 24, 1988 account.

2010-11-23T17:38:00.003-05:00

Martin Gardner

Shouldn't scientific thinking and logic work together?

Recently the Skeptical Inquirer magazine published an issue remembering the late Martin Gardner, a founding member of CSICOP/CSI (Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal, renamed Committee for Scientific Inquiry). I first encountered his work in Fads and Fallacies in the Name Of Science, a classic book in the skeptical field.

In a SI tribute by Ray Hyman this detail leaped out at me: Gardner would sometimes write a book review by just reading its index.

Hyman wondered how Gardner could read and review so many books with his busy schedule. Gardner replied that in most cases he didn't actually read a book, he just scanned the index for the info he needed to write his review.

As I've mentioned before, sometimes I skim-read / skip-read a book, i.e., I'll peruse a few passages and jump around from spot to spot. When writing a review I mention this, letting the reader know that I haven't read a book from cover to cover. That way the reader knows I'm only commenting on certain aspects, not the entire work.

And please note: I haven't read the SI tribute issue for Martin Gardner (September/October 2010) from cover to cover. I just read a couple of the tributes.

From what I gather, Gardner didn't inform his readers about his index scanning method of book reviewing. Not very journalistic or scientific.

But this doesn't surprise me. One time in a SI interview (published March/April 1998; link below) Gardner revealed that he believed in God and a soul that lives on. He admitted that he had no evidence that either God or a immortal soul existed; he invoked fideism, a view that such things can't be proven by reason but by faith alone and that's OK if it makes you feel good.

So what about those who follow astrology or other fringe beliefs that Gardner would criticize with scientific skepticism? Why can't they invoke fideism? After all, doesn't astrology make a believer feel good, giving meaning to life?

Maybe it's a matter of who you are. If you're a intellectual skeptic, you're allowed to believe in an unprovable idea because you can use a philosophical copout like fideism.

I'm an atheist. Martin Gardner, prove me wrong. Send me a message from the great beyond like Houdini.

Sources:

-- Skeptical Inquirer, September/October 2010 (Print version): Martin Gardner: A Polymath to the Nth Power by Ray Hyman, page 28-29.

-- A Mind at Play: Interview with Martin Gardner

2010-11-05T02:54:00.004-04:00

Are You There Zehaas? Its Me, Kal-El

Memory trigger.

Over at his blog, The X Spot, X. Dell (no relation) has been running a series of posts dealing with Ed Walters and the Gulf Breeze sightings.

In November 1987 a resident of Gulf Breeze, Florida, contractor Ed Walters, was nearly abducted during a UFO encounter, zapped by a blue beam. The aliens started to abduct Ed, lifting him off the ground with the beam, but he fought back. He screamed "Aagghh!" and the aliens dropped him and left.

Thus begins Ed's story in the book, The Gulf Breeze Sightings (1990), co-written (as such) with his wife Frances. (I don't notice any discernable differences in writing styles between Ed's and Frances's sections.) As explained in the book, the aliens kept showing up now and then, telepathically saying stuff to Ed like "Zehaas, in sleep you will know."

When X. Dell mentioned the name Zehaas it triggered a memory. The main detail I had retained after reading TGBS many years ago was the alien's name for Ed. So I checked out a copy of the book from the library and started skip-reading through it again. (Some books aren't worth a full read.)

Originally Ed tried to stay in the background, calling himself Mr. X (definitely no relation) when he submitted the Polaroid snaps from his first UFO encounter to the Sentinel, a local newspaper. On page 243 of TGBS it's mentioned that a Sentinel editor received a call from a woman who suggested that since the aliens spoke Spanish at times that Zehaas was really "cejas" (pronounced "See-hass"), the word for eyebrows. Ed wrote that since he had curly eyebrows maybe the aliens were eyebrowless, impressed by his prominent ones.

Yeah, right.

Ed's story doesn't hold up for a number of reasons. As X. Dell explains at his blog Ed faked a photo one time of a "demon." After he moved away from the house where all the weird stuff went down, the new owners found an UFO model similar to what was seen in Ed's photos hidden under some attic insulation.

Even without this revelation I find it hard to buy Ed's story with its old-style sci-fi pulp magazine details like a small alien who appears in a metal suit with a futuristic cattle-prod. Or the UFO that looks like something out of an old TV series like Tom Corbett, Space Cadet. And don't get me going about the hack-writer name for an alien, "Zehaas."

I haven't read the two books by Ed that followed TGBS so I don't know if the Zehaas mystery was ever explained. Going by what is offered in TGBS it seems that Ed might have been working towards a story that he was part alien or had some sort of alien connection. You know, the trite SF story about a prince from another world who is exiled to Earth as a baby because the bad guys on his own world have killed off the rest of the royal family. Or maybe his world just went BOOM! but he got away.

This isn't anything new outside of science fiction. In an article entitled "Alien Memories And Dreams" paranormal writer Brad Steiger observes:

"The whole matter of sensible men and women who claim alien memories and persistent dreams of extraterrestrial origin invites extensive speculation. Are these people, because of their higher intelligence and greater sensitivity, rejecting an association with Earth because of all the inadequacies and shortcomings, which they witness all around them?

"Does the mechanism of believing oneself to be of alien heritage enable one to deal more objectively with the multitude of problems, which assail the conscientious, and caring at each dawn of a new day?"

Steiger collects information on human hybrids with alien DNA with his Starseed Questionnaire. I don't know the validity of all those who claim to be "Star People" but if Ed Walters and his "Zehaas" rap was intended to go in that direction, faked Polaroids and a concealed UFO model undermine any of his claims.

2010-10-23T04:43:00.000-04:00

Notes From A Paranormal Expo

I drifted around like a ghost, staying in the background, jotting impressions down in my small notebook.

Saturday. 10/16/10. A year later; how time flies. Same location, the old gym on a former military base in Plattsburgh, NY. This second time for the paranormal expo had the same set up: vendors upstairs, lecturers downstairs.

Reviewing my notes:

-- The main area upstairs for vendor tables: a basketball court. Like a high school that has to use its gymnasium for both athletic and social events. Today a paranormal expo. Upcoming events: a sock hop, a bake sale, and then the big game.

-- Psychic sits at a folding table in the middle of a basketball court, giving a reading. The readee across from the psychic, intent on what the reader has to say. Me, I would want more privacy. The burning candle works in a small dimly lit room but not a brightly lit gym.

-- Missed the presentation on UFOs in Northern New York State, my neck of the woods. Other lectures focused on the supernatural.

-- Four people sit towards the back of the lecture room, two couples. Skeptics, making cynical comments to themselves. I'm halfway between them and the lecturer, just close enough to pick up their vibes. I don't buy everything the lecturer states but at least I'm mature enough to keep my negative thoughts to myself. A polite ghost. After a while the snide four leave. Hope a gang of poltergeists slaps them silly tonight.

-- A paranormal investigator states that most hauntings don't involved demonic spirits. But he doesn't discount such evil beings. A Roman Catholic, he conducted the rite of exorcism one time but as a lay person. He wasn't entitled like a priest to read two certain lines from the rite.

-- A healer shows the invisible. She invites people from the audience up front. The person stands there and the healer uses dowsing rods to show the size of that person's energy field. Large fields = personal imbalance, emotional distress.

-- Lecturers repeated common New Age/paranormal beliefs:

* A nasty person while living becomes nasty spirit after death.

* Weird things happen with quantum physics; that's why weird things happen with the paranormal.

* Chiropractors can cure many ills with spine alignment; even babies should visit one.

* Live in the now, not the past or the future.

* Everyone to varying degrees has psychic powers. Not everyone can be a psychic superstar (Uri Geller) but can develop potential powers.

* Children are open-minded, able to see more than adults. But are conditioned not to believe in spirits, UFOs, etc., lose ability to see more.

-- Paranormal investigators talked about devices they use. EMF - electro-magnetic field - detector: reveals ghostly activity or malfunctioning fluorescent light. Scalar microphone: detects multi-dimensional wave patterns; akin to sound waves through time; like dowsing rod, different results with different users.

This year's paranormal expo had the same attendance rate, around 900 people according to newspaper articles. But considering the state of the economy, that's good, it held its own. If there's a third one next year and I'm around, I'll try to attend -- either in my present physical form or whatever. (I always wanted to knock an EMF detector off the scale.)

2010-09-27T02:48:00.000-04:00

Alien Saviors To Appear Oct. 13th

Tentatively, that is.

Retired Air Force Officer Stanley A. Fulham apparently is hedging his bets by saying 10/13/10 is the day that alien craft might provide a spectacular display over principal cities here on Planet Earth. I'm not too excited because where I live, Plattsburgh, NY, isn't a principal city. (Hell, it isn't even a city.)

And it seems these aliens are being a bit snooty about visiting. According to Fulham who gets his info via a "world renowned channeler," the aliens don't want to initially contact us because of the fear and panic that might result, so no planetfall or direct communications, just a massive show of their craft. (Or maybe they don't want to rub elbows -- or whatever they have analogous to elbows -- with the terran hoi polloi.)

Then why the (tentative) UFO display? Mankind is poisoning the planet and it has to wake up before it's too late. The aliens, called Transcenders (cousins to the Transformers?), are a group of ethereal beings who have lived for eons in various incarnations. They have seen other worlds pollute themselves to death. The (tentative) display will be the first step by the aliens, making mankind realize that it is not alone in the universe. From this breaking-in period the Transcenders will eventually make contact and save our world from CO2 pollution, cleaning up our bad act by 2015 or sooner.

Fulham has written a book, Challenges of Change (3rd ed.), that details his knowledge of UFOs since World War II and later with NORAD. With shades of Major Philip J. Corso, his book explains the government is aware of ET visitations but believes mankind isn't ready for the shocking truth. To borrow a line from Saucer Smear editor, Jim Moseley: Wheee!

The PR release laying this all out ends with this key point:

"Fulham clarifies there are no absolutes; the principal of free will and choice that exits with all souls precludes all absolute realities, and the aliens may decide to postpone their intervention -- but the Transcenders confirm it will nonetheless occur in 2010."

Me, I won't be surprised if the intervention is moved up to 2011, 2012, 2013...

I'd like to be wrong but how many times has this story been told before without the promised pay-off?

--Source: http://sites.google.com/site/challengesofchange/

2010-09-22T03:56:00.005-04:00

Is Richard Hoagland The Bee's Knees?

After (more or less) reading the book Dark Mission I wanted to follow up on Richard Hoagland's research into torsion physics. What I found was a hornet's nest.

Worker honeybees have been disappearing. It's called Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) or honey bee depopulation syndrome (HBDS). Whatever label you choose, the fact remains that domesticated honeybees are a key link in the world's life cycle, providing pollination to agricultural crops.

What's causing the problem? It could be factors such as pesticides, genetically modified crops, mites, insect diseases, or some combination of these and other factors.

But Richard Hoagland has the answer:

Our civilization has developed marvelous gadgets, giving us instantaneous, worldwide data and audio-visual communcation [sic]. The signals travel through "empty space" on invisible electromagnetic waves -- for which, the existence of civilization (if not our own existence!) now depends. Nature and the biology of the "natural world" is no different -- but instead of electromagnetic waves, it uses (in part) something called "torsion fields" for the same essential purpose -- to transmit vital signals into and between living eco-systems, so that they may function properly.

In Dark Mission Hoagland and co-author Mike Bara gone on about hyperdimensional physics. From what I've read there isn't much difference between HD and quantum physics. With quantum stuff it's all a lot of speculation with mystical formulae, of spooky stuff like the observer influencing the observation, a cat both dead and alive, the universe is made up of silly string, whatever.

Now E=mc2. That's impressive. You can see the effect with the detonation of an atomic bomb. But until there's a Q-bomb, quantum physics is a lot of talk about nothing.

I won't go into all the details about torsion physics except to say it doesn't have any dead-alive cats (as far as I know). Hoagland does claim it promises all sorts of free energy for mankind, that's why "They" are keeping it a secret.

As for the case of the disappearing honeybees, Hoagland states the torsion field background flux might be changing, ergo "the domesticated bees may have lost their equally fundamental torsion navigation systems." It's a matter of lost, not dead, bees.

The online article that is my source (see below) is dated April 2007. There's the promise of "Part II Currently in Preparation" but I haven't found it. Maybe Hoagland got mentally lost from a torsion flux.

Anything is possible with those damn torsion fields.

Source:

The Bees' Needs: It's the Physics, Stupid!

2010-09-21T03:05:00.003-04:00

Papernet: An Interesting Train Of Thought

Fred Argoff is fascinated with Brooklyn and trains.

I've enjoyed his zine, Brooklyn!, but always wondered about his other niche publication, Watch The Closing Doors. A copy of WTCD has been added to my burgeoning zine collection, issue #51. It's a basic DIY B&W zine, digest sized and saddle stitched, no frills, but more entertaining than most of the slick mainstream titles stuffing the newsstand shelves.

Fred is now employed as a tower operator but in his earlier years he was a conductor for the New York City Transit Authority. The stories he can tell, like a man trying to drop kick his train and the unexpected result.

But he doesn't confine his coverage to just NYC. The issue goes global, photos showing the interior of a modern Warsaw station, ridin' the rails in Bulgaria, and a clever NO SMOKING sign at a Moscow station. Considering that this zine is laserprinted or photocopied, the quality of the photos is good. (Want great photo reproduction? Buy an expensive slick magazine loaded with annoying ads.)

I'm not a "railfan" but I did enjoy this issue because I'm interested in history and architecture, two topics that Fred covers within his study of locomology (Did I just coin a word?). And there are also the "people stories" that Fred shares in the "Things Happen" section.

WTCD #51 also features an article by guest writer Mark Strickert on the first section of the Phoenix, Arizona light rail system. It's good to hear that this mass transit system has been a hit, a large number of riders.

And for someone like me who doesn't own a car, more emphasis on mass transit in this country, especially by rail, is welcome. Watch The Closing Doors might be early at the station as a new age for train travel dawns.

Snail mail a couple of dollars (bills, well hidden) for a sample copy of WTCD to:

Watch The Closing Doors
Fred Argoff, Editor
Penthouse L
1170 Ocean Parkway
Brooklyn, NY 11230-4060

2010-09-18T02:28:00.001-04:00

Paladino's Stink

Don't live in New York State? Be glad. In a survey NY ranked at the bottom of the list for happiness.

And really be happy that you're not on the mailing list for GOP gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino.

As I mentioned in a previous post, Paladino wants to revamp closed state prisons into education camps for welfare clients where they can learn new job skills and, just as importantly, good personal hygiene. For we all know that social services clients don't know how to bathe.

Apparently Paladino is on a roll with the bad smell motif because he recently sent out a mailer with the message, SOMETHING STINKS IN ALBANY. And to back up his point, the enclosed material gives off an unpleasant odor.

Paladino says he wants to clean up Albany, not with a broom but "with a baseball bat." Great. Al Capone's management style will really fix all the problems.

Need I add that Paladino is a Tea Party favorite?

2010-09-18T01:57:00.001-04:00

Dark Mission: The Moon Hoax Meme

It's an interesting story but has anyone besides Richard Hoagland come forward about the incident?

July 22, 1969.

Von Karman Auditorium, Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), California.

Richard Hoagland, 23-year-old science advisor to CBS news during the Apollo program, notices a man who appears out of place before a press conference. The man is dressed in jeans, wearing a long cowpuncher coat, a leather bag hanging from his shoulder. The weather is warm that day.

The "great coat guy" (as Hoagland refers to him) was leaving materials on each seat in the auditorium. The man is accompanied by Frank Bristow, head of the JPL press office, who was properly attired for the occasion, white shirt and black tie.

At this time Apollo 11 is returning home with Neil Armstrong, the first man to step on the moon. and Mike Collins, the second man to walk upon the lunar surface.

Hoagland observes Bristow escort his guest to the press room area where the great coat guy hands his material to leading reporters from news organizations like the New York Times.

Curious Hoagland opens up one of the handouts to find a small American flag made of aluminized mylar and two mimeographed pages. Hoagland keeps the shiny flag but tosses the pages into the trash.

Why did he find the mimeographed message to be so worthless? It stated NASA "has just faked the entire Apollo 11 Lunar landing...on a soundstage in Nevada."

This incident is told in the Introduction to the book, Dark Mission: The Secret History of NASA, by Hoagland and Mike Bara. Of course, Hoagland rejects the "All the moon landings were faked" conspiracy theory because he believes that not only did NASA send men to the moon, the astronauts came back with alien artifacts found there that prove the existence of an ancient solar-system spanning ET civilization, a story being held from the public.

The great coat guy incident was an official "Op," according to Hoagland, to plant a meme in the minds of people that would be stimulated to go viral years later with such prods as Did We Land On The Moon?, a TV special broadcast on Fox in 2001. Even the shiny flag was planted as a mnemonic device making it easier to recall the incident and the handout's message.

The story of the moon landing hoax is an attempt, says Hoagland, to direct attention away from the evidence that he and others have accumulated proving the reality of alien buildings on the moon and Mars.

Hoagland sees astounding details in NASA photos. To me what looks like lens flare, tricks of light, and image defects is to Hoagland floating glass structures.

Maybe back in 1969 at JPL he misinterpreted what he saw. It could be the head of the press office was playing along with a kook, letting the great coat guy have his say to entertain the reporters there.

2010-08-23T02:01:00.002-04:00

Mary Roach Is Going At It Again

Yes, snarky science writer Mary Roach penned a book about sex research. No, the book wasn't called Stiff.

Stiff was about decaying corpses; Bonk is about copulating live bodies (well, for the most part. There is mention of autoerotic death and whether a beating-heart cadaver could have an orgasm if properly stimulated). Mary goes at her subject with the usual curiosity and irreverence befitting a woman who was raised as a strict Catholic. (Too strict, of course. Press down on that spring all you want but someday -- BOING! Or in this case, BONK!)

Bonk is subtitled The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex. That coupling part also includes Mary and her husband who volunteer to have an intimate moment recorded by dynamic 3D ultrasound imaging. Why bother with dull regular ultrasound for such an occasion? Just go all the way.

Going solo Mary gets some hands-on experience with a photoplethysmograph probe used to gauge her reactions while watching videos both neutral and erotic. Besides physical reactions, psychological responses were also recorded with the arousometer. One would think such a device would be high tech, using a PET scan to monitor brain activity, but actually it's nothing but a lever similar to a car's automatic transmission shifter operated by the subject to indicate her reactions. She moves the lever up and down to record her level of arousal. Of course, a computer touchscreen would work as well but then the Freudian symbolism is lost.

And Mary makes this poignant observation, one that brings laughter to MIB's:

"Orgasm appears to be a state not unlike that of the alien abductees one always hears about, coming to with messy hair and a chunk of time unaccounted for."

Along the way the reader will also encounter the postage stamp tumescence test, the Smithsonian Institution penis bone collection, the Thrillhammer, and even clamping vaginas.

At one point Mary refers to a scene from the Woody Allen movie, Annie Hall. This supposedly explains her book's dedication: For Woody.

2010-08-22T19:59:00.001-04:00

Smell Bad? Off To Camp With You

I wonder how this story will play with the New World Order conspiracy crowd.

Basing his ideas on the Civilian Conservation Corps program of the Great Depression, politician Carl Paladino wants to transform under-used New York State prisons into special dorms (or camps) for people on welfare. Such a center would train welfare recipients to acquire new skills. Also -- according to gubernatorial candidate Paladino -- the campers would be given lessons in "personal hygiene."

Of course this program would be voluntary. (Did you know filing an income tax form annually is also "voluntary?") Out-of-work prison guards would become counselors for such a dorm set-up. After years of walking the cell blocks with billy clubs, I wonder how many guards would have an affinity to "counsel" someone.

As Paladino explained in an Associated Press article: ""Instead of handing out the welfare checks, we'll teach people how to earn their check. We'll teach them personal hygiene ... the personal things they don't get when they come from dysfunctional homes."

Is Paladino out of touch with reality? Well, he is a wealthy real estate developer of the Republican stripe. Quick, Carl, what does a quart of milk and a loaf of bread cost? What's the minimum wage in New York State? Hey, don't turn to your aide for the answers.

Now the NWO alarmists might say this is the first step. Round up the smelly people first. Next will be the ones who don't smell but still need a job. Then the ones who don't get behind the program, those disloyal to American principles.

Paladino says his special camps would train welfare recipients to become state employees, working at state parks or in public service or even in "military service." Gee, does that last one include brown shirt uniforms?

For some reason Paladino is a favorite of the Tea Party. I thought the Tea Baggers opposed socialism and the government control that presumably goes with it. Maybe they're also NWO dupes.

Source: "NY candidate: Prison dorms for welfare recipients" By Bethy Fouhy (AP)

2010-08-12T00:31:00.003-04:00

Zine Zone Updated

Over at my Website, www.xrayer.com, I've updated the Zine Zone archives once again for my snail mail zine. I've simplified the layout to save time for myself. The latest issues of the Ray X X-Rayer, #75 and #76, will be found in the 2010 file. After you click on that file you will find links in ascending order, oldest to the newest, the latest issues at the end, of course.

For those unaware of my zine, it collects posts from this blog into an easy-to-print format (PDF). I used to put links on the main page for my Website but I'm getting burnt out with computers, HTML and all the rest. I trying to keep things as simple as possible. The main page will announce when a new zine has been archived but without a link.

Speaking of computer burn out, I almost threw my HP printer out the window. Even though I had converted a color image into grayscale and the set the printer to grayscale, pink blotches were showing up in the B&W images. After wasting a lot of time, ink and paper, I found the solution: the stupid HP printer has to be told to print grayscale images using only black ink. I had to check the box for Use Black Ink. Yes, computers save time, especially with user-unfriendly programs and useless Help files.

I was using Open Office and while I support free open source programs, I want to use programs that WORK. Open Office is supposed to be compatible with Word documents but it kept screwing up. In fact, it would even screw up with a RTF (rich text document) file, wrecking the format, making it unfixable. So I uninstalled Open Office. Good riddance.

I do miss one feature with Open Office, the option to convert a .doc file into PDF. That worked great. But when the file is screwed up, who wants to covert it to PDF? I use CutePDF to convert and it's OK. I might just stop screwing around with PDF and archive my zine files as plain RFT so that any word processing program can open them.

Then again I might stop print zining. I'm down to a handful of subscribers -- actually swappers -- and in a few cases what I receive in return is semi-readable junk, print too small or poor overall quality. Maybe that sounds elitist to you. I don't expect a zine have slick, high production standards. If it's a bit rough around the edges, OK, but it should at least have minimal quality. And with these aging orbs, I don't need the eyestrain.

* * *

ADDENDUM: Forget RTF. I always thought that format would give you a smaller file than a .doc file. But after some eXperimenting I found that when I converted a Word document of around 800k to RTF, the RTF one bloated to over 10 MB. It seems that images really blow up the file. And even when I start from scratch, starting with a RFT file and adding images, it ends up being much bigger than a .doc file. Amazing. I always thought RTF had less bloat than a Word document. And with limited space at my Website, the smaller the better when it comes to uploads.

With RFT I lose formatting and my headers (issue # and page #). But with PDF conversion I end up with a smaller file that retains all formatting. Good thing I checked this out now than waiting to do it later when I wanted to archive my next zine.

2010-08-01T23:21:00.002-04:00

X This Date: August 4

Mark a big X on your calendar: Wednesday, August 4. Why? It's the birthday of Supreme Commander James W. Moseley. If my math is correct, Jim is 79.

I want to include a photo of Jim with this post and so I'll type "james moseley" "saucer smear" into Google for an image search. Now here's a shot of him:

OK, wrong image. Google isn't perfect. Let's try again:

That's better.

The last issue of Saucer Smear took a while to arrive via snail mail. Jim states in every edition that it's a NON-SCHEDULED NEWSLETTER -- meaning he publishes it whenever he gets around to it. (My zine is also NSN.) But some readers noticed a long gap in his non-schedule. A while ago Jim had a fall and it took a while for him to recover. Apparently he's OK because the last issue of Smear is on target as usual.

For a sample copy, mail two dollars US to James Moseley, PO Box 1709, Key West, Florida 33041. Maybe you can hide the cash inside a birthday card.

Happy Birthday, Jim.

2010-07-28T01:26:00.002-04:00

Yuks And Yuck!

Sounds like a good thing to do. Donate your body to science. Maybe your corpse will help train a young surgeon so when he's working on a living body he will have the practical experience not to cut the wrong part.

Crash test dummies don't provide the same information as a human body. OK, I won't feel the impact, so let my corpse test the limits of new safety restraints in a vehicle.

But leaving my fresh (i.e. unembalmed) cadaver out in a fenced-in grove and let nature run its course to see what happens -- well, let me think about that one. I sunburn so easily. (And I'm already too bloated now as it is.)

And using my lifeless flesh for vain cosmetic reasons, to "aggrandize penises" -- to use Mary Roach's phrase -- I think I'm ending up on the short end of the donation deal.

The nonfiction book, Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, is a blend of gags (author Mary Roach's snarky comments and puns) and gags (referring to the reader's physical reactions to gross -- and I do mean gross -- anatomy). She mentions how people who conduct scientific research or investigate fatal disasters have to objectify human remains, pretend that they're made of wax, for example. Her humor is her objectification, especially when she sees a bloated body that's been in a left outside as part of research into criminal forensics.

In Chapter 5, Beyond the Black Box, she discusses how corpses can provide additional clues to the cause of an airplane crash. She interviews an injury analyst who investigated the TWA Flight 800 disaster, a plane that exploded over the Atlantic in July 1996 while en route from the US to Europe. Flight 800 is a favorite among conspiracy theorists who believe nothing happens by accident. What appears to be accidental was actually planned, they believe, the result of machinations being executed by a shadowy Mega-Conspiracy.

The argument is that some witnesses noticed a streak of light going up towards the doomed plane, indicating a missile was fired at it. One theory has the plane being shot down by an US submarine that was in the area at the time.

Others argue that the streak of light was only flame shooting out from Flight 800 after vapors in a fuel tank were ignited by frayed wiring. Because of the viewing conditions, an illusion was created that the light streak was traveling upward.

Chapter 5 lays out all the details how the injury analyst determined that it was an exploding fuel tank, not a missile, that caused the crash. Of course Mary holds back on her jokes during this part of the book, showing how bodies retrieved from the ocean provided clues to what happened.

If you're someone disturbed by corpses being classified by a damage rating system -- from Green (body intact) to Red (loss of three or more extremities or complete transection of the body) -- then you won't be able to handle much of this book.

2010-07-15T05:15:00.004-04:00

"My Beautiful Indestructible Fish Man"

Rick Baker, eat your heart out.

The title of this post? A quote by Dr. Simond Trent, mad scientist in the movie "Curse of the Swamp Creature" (1966).

This grade Z effort was recently broadcast on the television network This TV, sponsored by that new miracle drug, Colon Flow.

Dr. Trent is hiding out in a Texas swamp, transforming human beings into fish men. Of course, none of these humans volunteered for his experiments but when the law is far away, who's going to stop you?

Well, maybe the local "natives," poor blacks who live in the same swamp. Trent exploits the locals, forcing one to be his lieutenant and number one lackey. Another local ends up as a failed experiment, dumped into a screened swimming pool loaded with hungry alligators who like to chew up the scenery.

Besides the locals, John Agar shows up, a geologist searching for oil in the swamp. He doesn't suspect that the people in his party -- a B-girl, a slow-witted young adult named Ritchie, and a guide named Rabbit -- have done away with the oil man he was supposed to meet. The B-girl -- first name Brenda -- is pretending to be the wife of the murdered oil man, using the name "Mrs. West."

This party of idiots travel by motorboat through the swamp. Scene after scene is shown of the swamp. Hey, it's free, so shoot it. Eventually they end up at Dr. Trent's home where he has been holding his wife a virtual prisoner.

Mrs. Trent -- portrayed by "statuesque" Francine York -- at one point is alone with John Agar. She tells him that her husband is insane, they have to escape. John doesn't buy it. After all, it's normal for someone to keep hungry alligators in his swimming pool.

The party of idiots stay the night at Trent's home. John sleeps in the living room, apparently a sound sleeper. Trent passes by him, carrying another dead experiment from his lab for a late night swimming pool party. Later the mad doctor drugs Brenda, the so-called Mrs. West, and carries her right by John. Apparently John could sleep through Trent dragging a trumpeting elephant into his lab.

Trent has locked up his wife in the lab closet. Despite her screaming, John doesn't hear a thing, despite both the lab door and the closet door not being that thick or soundproof.

Ritchie the stupid overgrown kid goes off and spies on a voodoo ceremony. What is odd is that the leader of the ritual is Trent's number one lackey. Why is he now putting on a voodoo mask and stirring up the others against his master? Motivation is as murky as a dark swamp in this movie.

As the oppressed locals leave, Ritchie is entranced by a girl who danced provocatively during the voodoo ceremony. Apparently voodoo got his mojo working. Following her back to her home, he corners the girl in her dressing room, telling her: "Be good, baby. There's nobody here but us chickens." Will Ritchie ignore the warning about staying away from the river and the quicksand when he chases the poor girl? Do I really have to answer that question?

Ritchie's last words: "I won't hurt you... help me... helpgurglegurgle--"

Let me mention the actor Bill Thurman has a dual roll in this cinematic classick. He's the overweight oil man who is killed in the beginning. And in the end he's the flabby monster with bad make-up who is supposed to be the slender Brenda/Mrs. West transformed into a fish woman.

John Agar wakes up when he hears a gunshot outside the house and somehow he finally notices Mrs. Trent screaming in the closet. The mad doctor orders his creature to attack the mob of locals approaching his home. John and Mrs. Trent try to convince Fishified Brenda to attack the mad doctor. This scene is shot through the eyes of the monster, all three actors trying to influence it/her. It's a technique called Ham-O-Vision.

Mrs. Trent: "Look at yourself! You were a beautfiful girl, Brenda."

The monster visually checks itself, an amazing feat since its eyeballs are painted rubber balls cut in half. Will the monster turn on Dr. Trent and will they end up falling into the swimming pool filled with hungry alligators? Do I really have to -- never mind.

This movie features looped in dialogue done post production inside a big steel bin, beating drums that almost never stop, and sound synchronization off half a beat, from someone hitting a drum to hand-clapping. And let's not forget dialogue that the one microphone could barely pick up. Of course, there's all the "night" cinematography, scenes shot when the full moon was bright as the sun. Filmed more or less in color, apparently on some WW II era Kodak film left inside a hot warehouse in Brazil.

A small turtle makes the perfect crunchy snack while experiencing this disasterpiece.

[If you're a fan of goodbad movies, check out this series by X. Dell over at his blog, The X-Spot: http://xdell.blogspot.com/search/label/grindhouse.]

2010-07-11T03:11:00.003-04:00

Creating Dialogue With The FW Method

Does confrontation lead to conversion? Or is it better to try to open up a dialogue with someone who doesn’t share your view, calmly explaining your position, pointing to facts?

Apparently Rebecca Watson prefers the FW Method when promoting the skeptical viewpoint over at www.skepchicks.org . And what is that method? Check out her post on May 29th, 2010 entitled “It’s Like He’s Trying to Explain Evolution to Fuckwits”.

Yes, calling others who don’t share your POV “fuckwits” will really lead to changing their minds.

The title is actually a quote from Rebecca’s husband regarding book author Dr. Ahamed Kutty and his theory that the children of Adam and Eve didn’t commit incest. Kutty states that human fossils dating back 25,000 have been found that show the same DNA as modern man and these other humans mated with the children of Adam and Eve who appeared later in this world.

Adam and Eve, says Kutty, were the first fully developed human beings – they had “God conscious” – while the humans before them were not fully developed. Adam and Eve were created to lead other humans to God, to become moral.

Hey, I don’t buy it, especially Kutty’s conclusion when Adam and Eve were created. Unfortunately all I have is an interview with Kutty on Fox News (the video clip is linked in Rebecca’s post) where he had to present his beliefs in a TV news nutshell, no time to elaborate. I'm interested in learning how he concluded that Adam and Eve appeared 12,000 years ago. So I am skeptical about his views – but note I’m also skeptical about skeptics and some of their opinions.

Here’s Rebecca’s take on the issue:

“That’s right: an entire book devoted to the challenge of using science to justify Biblical creationism while reassuring Christians that no, you did not come from a guy doing the nasty with his sister. (But he may have fucked a monkey.)

“Be warned: the stupid is strong in this one. Please keep all palms far from all faces throughout the entirety of this clip.”

Instead of name-calling and stereotyping, it would’ve been better to question the basis behind Kutty's assertions. Like the Fox News reporter did in the video clip, the woman that Rebecca called “the idiot anchor.”

Leave it to Rebecca to preach to her cynical choir and leave out any possibility of possibly changing someone else’s mind because anyone who believes in creationism is a fuckwit. Interestingly, her attitude comes across as “holier than thou.”

Polarization is so much better than engaging in debate.

2010-07-10T04:17:00.004-04:00

Channeling Heaven

If you've been victimized by a Catholic priest, then St. John the Apostle, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and Jesus want to help you.

That's the message of "Heaven Speaks to Victims of CLERICAL ABUSE" (2005). The book is written by "Anne" but not in the sense of a traditional author. Described as a wife and mother, "Anne" hears messages in her heart from above which she records and shares with others. The process of "interior locution" -- which has the semblance of "channeling" as practiced by New Age psychics -- has resulted in a series of booklets published by the non-profit corporation Direction for Our Times.

As noted in "Heaven Speaks to Victims" Anne's bishop has given permission for the messages to be published. The publisher adds that all messages have been submitted to the Holy See for the Nihil Obstat and the Imprimatur.

The nihil obstat and imprimatur are official declarations granted by Roman Catholic Church officials that state a printed work is free of doctrinal or moral error but without the implication that the officials agree with everything presented in the work. What is important is the work won't harm one's faith or morals. It sounds like a variation of the standard disclaimer, "The views expressed by guests / interviewees / listeners / commenters are not necessarily those of this TV station / radio station / newspaper / Website, etc."

Here are some key points found in "Heaven Speaks:"

-- St. John the Apostle states that Jesus didn't assault young ones. It was done by those who had free will, who decided to commit such sins. Jesus didn't give free will to the abusers to assault innocent children. It was given so that a soul could choose heaven freely.

-- The Blessed Mother says that the world will benefit by the suffering of all victims because they will obtain from Jesus healing graces for their souls and also for other souls around them.

-- Jesus explains that clerical abuse is a double betrayal: both the victim and him were betrayed by those who claimed to serve heaven but instead served the enemy. Due to the circumstances of these misdeeds he is allotting unlimited graces for the healing of all victims. (Skeptics may say that Jesus is playing favorites.)

More information about "Anne" and her messages can be found at www.directionforourtimes.com .

2010-07-08T23:15:00.004-04:00

Oh, Those Auqanette Girls!

The Aquanettes. Don't confuse them with the hairspray product (Aqua Net) or the Belgian beach volley team (AquaNet). These young ladies are US astronauts in training under the ocean surface.

Yup, it's another classic episode of Sea Hunt, that old TV series starring Lloyd Bridges as scuba hero Mike Nelson. In an episode from 1961 he's been hired to help out with a special governmental program, Operation Astronette, training three women for a space trip to Venus. Apparently being underwater duplicates conditions on Venus.

Why Venus? Well, that planet is named after the goddess of love. And after all, Venus is for women while Mars is for men. Not to say "The Aquanettes" episode shows any signs of sexism from that time.

Of course, one trainee -- let's call her Sensitive Sue -- has problems, makes a mistake. She gets upset and cries. The real tough cookie of the trio, Brass Bitch, scorns Sensitive Sue. BB says Sue doesn't have what it takes to be an astronaut.

The third girl in the trio is Amiable Amy, at least amiable towards stud Mike Nelson. At one point she and Sue get in a catfight over Mike. Our hero throws both of them off the boat into the water to cool off.

Obviously these gals are ready for a rigorous space mission that doesn't tolerate any mistakes.

As the story progress, Sensitive Sue is involved with another screw-up while training with the others underwater. Back on the boat Brass Bitch rips Sue a new one.

Later Sue turns up missing. She's dived in by herself to prove she has the right stuff. Mike and the other two Aquanettes/Astronettes don their scuba gear and search for her. Mike gives BB his spear gun because sharks have been spotted. But when a shark shows up with the munchies, BB freezes up. But everyone escapes and are soon back on the boat where BB apologies to Sensitive Sue for the way she treated her before.

You see it's different when the flipper is on the other foot. Upset for freezing up and not dealing with the shark, Brass Bitch cries.

I think these three gals were chosen not for their expertise. They were chosen for their expendability. ("Dumb broads. Shoot them into space and let God take care of 'em.")

After seeing this episode, I began to wonder. Since it was such an emotional moment, did Neil Armstrong cry when he first stepped on the moon?

2010-06-22T23:28:00.004-04:00

Ghost In My Machine

I had a surprise today when I opened up my email. There was a message from Mac Tonnies.

Mac unexpectedly died in October 2009.

I check the message and noticed it was about a Tweet he made before he died.

Thanks to Facebook, everyone is trying to get into social networking, including Yahoo email. Call it The Flavor-Of-The-Month Syndrome. Next month everyone will be jumping on to a different fad.

Yahoo is pushing something called Updates, its variation on social networking. Here's the description:

"Updates like little news bulletins about you and your friends that appear in Yahoo! Mail and elsewhere in Yahoo!. Through updates you can find out things like when a friend has posted photos to Flickr, rated a restaurant, 'buzzed up' a news item, and more. Updates help people stay in touch by effortlessly letting each other know what they’ve been up to on Yahoo! and the web."

Updates can include profile pages and you can exchange messages, just like Facebook. So how did I get an update from Mac? Here's the answer from Yahoo:

"To help you get started, we automatically show you updates from select Yahoo! Contacts and Yahoo! Messenger friends. Of course, you have full control over what updates you want to see. The list of people you see updates from is for you only (private), so your relationships aren’t exposed to anyone else."

So a bot is making updates for people I know. Even dead people.

Mac's work lives on through his books, blog and Website. That's good. His writings are important. But oddly enough he has become a ghost thanks to mindless automatic programming. He was into transhumanism, a field where an individual mind could possibly live on beyond the physical body due to advanced technology.

Maybe this incident with Yahoo can be called autohumanism.

2010-06-21T01:52:00.004-04:00

Comet On The Curve

I'm walking home the other evening. To the west is a crescent moon. Above it is another object, most likely Venus. Or is it?

The bright spot above the moon is elongated. A comet?

Not really. I stop and stare at the puzzling light, moving my head up and down. I've worn eyeglasses since I was a pre-teen (I'm nearsighted) and over the years my lenses have grown thicker to keep pace with my deteriorating vision. As I lower and raise my glass Coke-bottle-bottoms, I noticed that the trail changes into a point when the light is centered in my lenses.

Obviously the elongation was distortion caused by the curvature of my glasses. One would think I would have noticed this sooner but apparently conditions weren't right until recently.

Now I see why when a field investigator makes an UFO report he notes whether or not the observer wears corrective lenses.

2010-06-21T01:48:00.001-04:00

Spiritual Placebo And The Truth

Some people claim they can channel Jesus.

For example, there is "Anne," a lay apostle of the Catholic faith who passes along messages from Heaven in a series of booklets published by Directions for Our Times. On the back cover of one booklet appears this statement:

"Anne, a wife and mother of six, reveals her journey to the heart of Jesus. The messages she hears in her heart, which she believes are from Jesus and Mary, reveal the tender, solicitous love that our Saviour has for each one of us."

I think of the Bible and its warning against false prophets and not allowing a witch to live. What if this "Anne" is in error?

Apparently anticipating such concerns, Directions for Our Times includes a special statement in its booklets. The publisher acknowledges that the Holy See of Rome has to make the final decision about the validity of private revelations. Then Pope Urban VIII (Maffeo Barberini; 1568-1644) is quoted:

"In cases which concern private revelations, it is better to believe than not to believe, for if you believe, and it is proven false, you will receive all blessings as if it had been true because you believed it to be true."

It's like the doctor who tells a patient that there's a special pill to treat the patient's particular ailment. The patient takes the pill and later he feels better, even though the special medication is nothing but a sugar pill with no healing properties. The Placebo Effect. If it works, give the deception a pass.

There is a fascinating aspect to Pope Urban's quote: there is debate about whether or not he made that statement.

But if you still believe it and he never said it, what's the harm? Just ignore the fact that all churches are supposed to be about The Truth.

(Historical footnote: Before Maffeo Barberini become pope, he had a patron-client relationship with the astronomer Galileo. But there was a dispute between them and Pope Urban III refused to pardon Galileo after the astronomer was found "vehemently suspect of heresy." Galileo's freedom was severely restricted by the church, even though he was correct in his observations. Like I said: The Truth.)

Sources:

"Heaven Speaks to Victims of Clerical Abuse" (Booklet. 2005)

http://galileo.rice.edu/gal/urban.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Urban_VIII#cite_note-8

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_Galilei#cite_note-19

2010-06-08T02:36:00.002-04:00

Parallel Conversations

Some people don't like Vern.

I monitored some of the last Liberty Net get-together on its stickam.com site, both audio and text. While the ham radio superpatriots were exhanging their right-wing beliefs on air, some were also communicating in the Stickam chatroom. What was interesting was the contrast between what was being said on the air by a particular Lib Netter and the reaction by the listeners participating in the chatroom. For example:

"n8wgm: If [Vern] was trained in propaganda, and admits it here, then why should we trust anything he says?"

This is a response to an on-air statement by Lib Netter Vern Kaspar that he was trained in propaganda analysis during World War II. I must admit the same thought crossed my mind. Maybe he's working for Them.

Seriously, I doubt Vern is an agent provocateur. But after seeing some of the chatroom comments, it's obvious that he's unintentionally provoking jealously.

Vern sounds like a pleasant gentleman. He's a good speaker, an asset for someone who owns a few radio stations. During his long life (he's 88 years old) Vern has spent a lot of time traveling abroad, visiting Russia, China, and many other points within the four corners of the world. And while I don't agree with everything he says, Vern sounds knowledgeable. But for some people, he's too well-traveled, too knowledgeable. (Edited chatroom comments follow.)

"n8wgm: There you go. HE's the expert."

"n8wgm: He talked to all the leaders of the world"

"wb8rav: ...just sitting here in wide eyed, rapt attention!...."

"n8wgm: They wanted his wisdom"

"n8wgm: Glad I can be here to be listening to the VERN net."

"thelibertynet: Vern certainly kills the rotation!"

"n8wgm: I, I , I , I, I, I, Vern is the EYE man."

"n8wgm: I did that. I had dinner with. I traveled to...I have a license.....I can speak...I can ....."

"wb8rav: Of course, Tovarich!"

"wb8rav: All Vern, ALL the time...what else you need?!"

"thelibertynet: self-satisfied adj having or showing a complacent satisfaction with oneself, one's own actions, behaviour, etc. self-satisfaction n"

"n8wgm: over half an hour of the marvelous Vern. I wonder when anyone will come on and say how wonderful it is to have Vern back."

OK, Vern does go on a bit with his on-air comments but maybe you could diplomatically tell him instead of acting like schoolkids jealous of the friendly rich boy with all the cool toys?

The Liberty Net meets every week to discuss the various threats to freedom, the lurking menaces biding their time until world domination is within easy reach. When the Illuminati and New World Order emerge from the shadows to take over the world, it's good to know that the Liberty Net gang is ready to protect individualism and resist the power of evil. That is, if they're not too busy backstabbing each other.

2010-06-08T02:32:00.003-04:00

Gosh, I Didn't Know That

Amazing what you can learn from listening to right-wing ham radio operators during their on-air discussions.

Take the last meeting of the Liberty Net (June 5th, 2010). Some info is so startling that when you hear it live, you say to yourself: "Did he really say that?" Fortunately for me and future historians, a Website -- http://3950.net -- archives recordings of each Saturday-night-into-early-Sunday-morning discussions. That way I can play back the comment and verify to my boggled mind that I did hear what I thought I had heard, right down to the hour, minute, and second.

For example, check out the June 5th recording (archived as Liberty Net - 2010-0605) around 1 hour, 39 minutes, 40 seconds [ 1:39:40 ]. Vic Misek, net coordinator, is talking about the Gulf Oil Spill, that the damaged rig should be examined to see if it had been hit by a torpedo. Then he makes this fascinating statement about the impact of the spill:

"The disaster I believe is overblown. Oil has been leaking into the Gulf of Mexico for thousands of years. A lot of it just seeps up from the bottom, there's a lot of oil under the Gulf of Mexico and some of it naturally comes up into the Gulf and the oil is eventually consumed by petroleum-consuming bacteria."

Really. There has always been oil-soaked wildlife and countless tar balls along the Gulf shores? I never knew that. From what I've seen on TV, that petroleum-consuming bacteria have been slacking off. Or maybe they're just a bit overworked lately.

Skip ahead to around 3:20:18. Discussion is focused on the dumbing down of the American public at large by the US gene pool being "stupefied" by illegal immigrants. This "demographic degeneration" is why Barack Obama was elected president, according to Vic Misek.

Then another Lib Netter, Vern Kaspar, makes the comment that he's heard that most black men are preferring to marry white women. This will also affect the overall intelligence of the US population.

Vic agrees with him, adding this statement: "The average mulatto intelligence falls halfway between the average black and the average white."

Really. I'd like to see the scientific study that supports that "dumb" statement. Please email the info, Vic.

2010-06-05T03:51:00.004-04:00

XR #74 & Website Redesign

If you prefer to read these blog posts in zine form, then check out my website, http://www.xrayer.com . Ray X X-Rayer #74 is now up to read on screen or print out and read on paper.

I've simplified xrayer.com, dropped some old articles and deleted the Word format zine versions. The zine archives are only in PDF. I've checked all the links but if there's a problem, please let me know.

2010-06-03T00:58:00.003-04:00

What Does It All Mean? Ask A Tree

“In accepting this Conclave’s nomination as the 73rd Sorcha Faal of our Order, I express the gratitude of all the Sisters in thanking Sister Lyuha for her guidance as our Sorcha Faal these past 7 years, especially her efforts these past 5 years in re-orienting all of us towards the Western World.

"Our Order has always striven to provide to this World that Light needed to dispel the myths inherent in Darkness, but which without we could never see the truest balance between the two.”

Sorcha Faal, 3 February 2007

* * *

It's like trying to dig a hole in a big pool of quicksand.

The conspiracy theory: North Korea blew up the British Petroleum oil rig, the Deepwater Horizon, causing the great Gulf spill. After all, if NK could attack and sink a South Korean vessel, why not one of our oil platforms?

OK, I'll do some Googling and take care of that topic in a few words.

The story: a cargo vessel from North Korea deployed a mini submarine within strike range of the Deepwater Horizon. The sub, manned by suicide team, fired two incendiary torpedoes and to make sure the job was done right, the team then exploded the sub directly underneath the rig.

What was the motive? Besides the fact that the rig was made in South Korea, the hated enemy of the North?

To put President Obama in a tight spot. According to a "report" circulating in the Kremlin, Obama might be forced to use a small nuclear device to seal off the well (the nuke option that I talked about in a prior post) during the an important conerence being held at the United Nations headquarters in New York City. The 2010 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons was scheduled from May 3rd - 28th.

As reported by the What Does It Mean website, "...if Obama chooses the 'nuclear option' it would leave the UN’s nuclear conference in shambles with every Nation in the World having oil rigs off their coasts demanding an equal right to atomic weapons to protect their environment from catastrophes too, including Iran." (Link listed below).

The article also notes: "And not just to the environmental catastrophe that is unfolding the only devastation to be wrecked upon the United States and South Korea by this North Korean attack as the economic liabilities associated with this disaster are estimated by these Russian reports to be between $500 Billion to $1.5 Trillion, and which only a declaration of this disaster being an 'act of war' would free some the World’s largest corporations from bankruptcy."

The author of this startling article about the Kremlin report is Sorcha Faal. And who is she? That depends. She could be a he.

Supposedly it's not one person but a series of women who take on that title. Like the Pope in the Vatican or Number 2 in "The Prisoner" TV series (the original). According to the WDIM site in a brief history, the Order of Sorcha Faal was founded in 588 BCE in Ireland. This order claimed Tamar Tehi, the oldest daughter of King Zedekiah, as its founder. The name Sorcha Faal has its origins in the ancient languages of Ireland. Faal means "the Dark and Barren Place." Not a great surname. But to counter that negative meaning, "Sorcha" means "She Who Brings Light." Reminds me of Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader. The OSF is claimed to have 18 monasteries around the world, including Russia and the US.

I wonder if any of those monasteries are listed in the telephone Yellow Pages.

On the flip side, according to the skeptics and critics (links below) the whole Sorcha Fall is a hoax being perpetrated by David Booth, computer programmer and writer of Apocalyptic tomes. Booth is supposed to be dead but in lives on behind the avatar of Sorcha Faal because some people are upset with his dubious actions in the past under his own name. The new Number 2 -- I mean Sorcha Faal -- is supposed to be a Russian academic but according to one researcher no one with that name is listed at the Russian Academy of Sciences website. Of course, that's assuming that she changed her name to Sorcha Faal and dropped her birth designation.

At this point I'm getting a headache. The more I dig, the faster the quicksand is sucking me in.

Actually it doesn't appear to be quicksand if you look at it closely enough...

* * *

Consider how small you are
Compared to your scream
The human dream
Doesn't mean shit to a tree

-- Eskimo Day Blues, Jefferson Airplane

* * *

Sources:

"US Orders Blackout Over North Korean Torpedoing Of Gulf Of Mexico Oil Rig"
http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/index1367.htm

"Who Is Sorcha Faal?"
http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/whoissorcha.htm

"Sister Maria Theresa is the 73rd Sorcha Faal of the Sorcha Faal Order, Elected as Mother Superior 3 February 2007"
http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/index738.htm

"2010 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons 3-28 May 2010"
http://www.un.org/en/conf/npt/2010/

"Sorcha Faal... Internet Hoax Queen Courtesy of One David Booth"
http://educate-yourself.org/cn/sorchafaaldisinfo15mar08.shtml

"Reader Asks - 'Who Is Sorcha Faal?'"
http://www.rense.com/general63/sorcha.htm

2010-06-03T00:56:00.003-04:00

Papernet: Theme Zine Has Devil In The Details

There must be a market for a zine about devil girls.
Randy Robbins publishes a review zine called Narcolepsy Press Review that reviews – well, zines. And with his last snail mailing of NPN I found another surprise in the 6 X 9 envelope: You’re an Angel, You L’il Devil #4.

The small booklet is loaded with photos and drawings of horny – I mean horned – females. It’s amazing how such a niche zine can find so much material, including drawings contributed by readers with an artistic bent.

If your interest is piqued, send two dollars (bills) to Randy Robbins, PO Box 17131, Anaheim, CA 92817-7131. Please mention Ray X sent you.

2010-05-29T04:57:00.006-04:00

Liberty Net Jamfest

I've been trying to listen to the May 22 - 23 recording of the Liberty Net with the emphasis on the word trying. I used to hear the transmissions between the ultra-right-wing ham radio operators live on my portable shortwave radio but reception usually sucks. So now I download the latest meet-up from the archives at http://3950.net.

Last Saturday jammers were out in force, illegally blocking the Lib Netters. Loud rock music and stupid comments from "Buck Rogers in the Holland Tunnel." I don't agree with most of what the Lib Netters espouse; I'm just trying to track conspiracy theories. Discussion during the last Liberty Net dealt with the theory that North Korea blew up the BP oil rig, the Deepwater Horizon, causing the disastrous oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Why? Because South Korea built the rig.

One Lib Netter said he gave that theory a 30 or 40 percent chance of being true, unlike Rush Limbaugh's "Environmental wackos blew it up" speculation that only rate a two percent with him. He read an article that stated that President Obama was covering up the story, keeping it from the American public.

There could have been some more discussion on the topic but the jammers came on and most of the recording is their interference. So much for my tracking.

But there seems to be an alternative for the Lib Netters: the Web. A couple of them worked around the jammers by streaming through Stickam, an online service that carries the Saturday night net live. They could keep commenting via audio or by using the instant messaging feature.

So as disagreeable as some may find their ultra-conservative views, the Liberty Net will keep pushing on, maybe even to the point of doing their discussions only online. That's OK until the cyber-jammers show up but unlike SW transmissions, such jammers should be easier to block and locate.

Free speech means the freedom to speak.

2010-05-27T01:48:00.003-04:00

Sea Hunt: Target USO

** Ahoy! Spoilers! **

"It was shiny and circular like a flying saucer."

And underwater, not in the sky.

I'm watching a rerun of an old TV show called "Sea Hunt" about the adventures of a ex-Navy frogman, Mike Nelson, portrayed by Lloyd Bridges. Usually the flippered hero is out chasing crooks and assorted other bad guys but this time around he's investigating reports of a sea monster off the coast of Mexico. He responds to an urgent message from a friend living in the area of the sighting.

The episode is entitled "Decoy," from the first season of "Sea Hunt" (First broadcast: Sept. 20, 1958). You can watch the episode at this link.

Whatever this unidentified submerged object is, when it approaches the shore, whales go nuts, jumping out of the water. It also emits a strange sound that is picked up by underwater microphones. One fisherman claimed it had eyes that burned and long flowing hair.

When the object is detected by an underwater microphone, Nelson -- ready to go in his scuba gear -- grabs his camera and dives in to find out what the mysterious visitor could be. But the turbulence from the speeding object is too much: he's tossed around like a seahorse trapped in a sealed aquarium bolted to the bed of a pickup truck with bad shocks racing down a potholed street. (How's that for a simile?) The visitor disappears without Nelson even getting a glimpse.

Time for a different tactic. Nelson has some nets rigged up and the object is trapped. He goes down and sees the visitor is manmade: it looks like a submerged Sputnik satellite.

The strange device is still active but Nelson knocks it out by pulling off its radio antennae. Later, after contacting US Naval Intelligence, he talks with an officer about the device.

The Navy lieutenant says that it's an underwater satellite, akin to a space satellite but one that orbits underwater. He doesn't know who made it but it could have been manufactured by one of a dozen countries, big or small. This is the 1950s. Days of the Soviet Union. How many countries belonged to that union? Those commie bastards! But whenever the Cold War situation rears its ugly head in a "Sea Hunt" episode, the foreign nation behind a particular oceanic bad deed is never named.

As for the details reported during its previous "orbits," the burning eyes were a couple of "light sensitive discs" on the sphere. The long, wild hair was kelp it had picked up along the way. If this thing created such strong turbulence, wouldn't kelp be torn apart and forced away before clinging to it?

Don't pay attention to science when watching an old TV show like this. For example, it's explained the small submerged satellite caused the tremendous turbulence from its great speed. And its great speed, Mike Nelson observes, was created from the device "using the pressure of the water itself for propulsion." Huh?

During the denouement Nelson tells one of the fishermen that he doesn't blame him for thinking the device was from another world.

But Nelson's friend, the one who called him in to investigate, says: "Who can say with all that is happening today?" Spooky.

Another episode - "Underwater Narcotics" - from Season 3 matches "Decoy" for being offbeat. Here is a plot description:

(First broadcast: Aug. 27, 1960) "Mike discovers a plant growing profusely on the ocean floor that turns out to be a hybrid cannabis..."

Underwater marijuana? I don't use drugs but, man, that has to be one salty smoke. The kelp aftertaste must be a killer.

Unfortunately this episode doesn't seem to be available for viewing online. I caught it on the This TV network early one morning.

2010-05-26T03:13:00.001-04:00

XR #73

It's up, the latest PDF version of my hardcopy zine, the Ray X X-Rayer. Go to www.xrayer.com, scroll down to the PDF zine section and click on XR #73b. Snail mail readers have received a pamphlet version, a double-sided sheet, but I didn't want to confuse my online readers with the details of printing that out. So what's online is just three pages, 1-3, no special lay out. And with the problems I had putting together the hardcopy pamphlet, I should've stayed with a straight lay out instead of getting compleX.

Of course, each X-Rayer reformats a few posts from this blog into an easy-to-read zine.

2010-05-21T01:24:00.002-04:00

Conspiracy Theorist Rush Limbaugh

Environmental "wackos" might have blown up the BP oil rig that is gushing disaster into the Gulf of Mexico, according to Rush Limbaugh.

Sure. And if someone attacks this blog and shuts it down, I'll blame it on neo-Nazi Zionist Amish radicals. (We all know how dangerously tech-savvy Amish radicals are.)

I used to tune in Rush's right-wing conservative circus / radio show to verify that he remained a bloviating bag of bullshit. But thanks to the Internet Rush's stupid comments can be found without the pain of listening to an entire program.

One of the few times I tuned in Rush he was saying that the Democrats might have screwed up the economy so that Obama could be elected. I did some Googling and learned that informative comment was spewed way back on December 22nd, 2008. When I heard it I thought how appropriate it was to spread such negative BS during the holiday season.

His "Democrats did in the economy" theory involved NY Senator Chuck Schumer starting a run on a California bank during the summer, creating panic and unease that helped the evil liberal Demos win the White House and gain more seats in Congress. Rush said that this part of a plan by Obama and the Democrats to push the nationalization of US industries -- that Commie take-over type of stuff that the John Birch Society used to foist on the public.

But what's so funny is that Rush in the past wouldn't tolerate any Illuminati / New World Conspiracy theories to discussed on his program when listeners called in. At cuttingedge.org -- a web site warning the public that the NWO plot is "spiritually based," i.e., it's God Vs. Satan -- there is an open letter to Rush, taking him to task for his disbelief:

"On March 11, 1998, Rush Limbaugh reiterated his long standing policy against any consideration of 'Conspiracy Theories' as a possible explanation for any event(s) that have occurred in history, or which might occur in the future. In a phone conversation with another Conservative host, Rush said that such a belief constituted 'Intellectual Laziness', and, of course, he, Rush Limbaugh, would not and could not condone such a belief."

But on occasion Rush is throwing out stuff just as "intellectually lazy" as anything promulgated by the anti-NWO crowd. Environmental wackos blowing up the Deepwater Horizon rig to stop President Obama's plan for more offshore drilling. It's like something out of a bad movie -- a bad movie like "Special Bulletin," a made-for-TV turkey from 1983 in which radical scientists concerned about the proliferation of nuclear weapons build a homemade A-bomb and threaten to set it off unless all nuclear detonators are removed from Charleston, South Carolina. Of course, the wackos end up accidentally blowing up Charleston.

Anyway, here's an audio link so that you can hear Rush in his own words theorizing why environmentalists decided to save the environment by destroying it:

And by the way, Rush has also claimed that Obama wants to ban sports fishing. Now there's a fish story if I ever heard one.

2010-05-20T01:05:00.004-04:00

Gulf Oil Spill: The Nuclear Option

(Composite image by Ray X).

Russian science journalist Vladimir Gubarev has a solution to the Gulf oil spill: nuke it.

In a Pravda article he explains how the Soviet Union used nuclear bombs to seal off wells:

"The USSR had a sad experience in containing oil-well flowing in Central Asia. Two breakdowns occurred almost simultaneously... The two giant flames were extinguished with the help of nuclear explosions. They drilled two wells to approach the emergency wells under the ground and lowered nuclear devices into the wells. The troubled wells were blocked as a result of the explosions."

The Russian science journalist explains that he was present during the successful explosions. Gubarev then writes that the Soviet scientists wanted to promote their oil-spill-stopping technology to other countries but the US declined due to concerns about radioactivity.

The atomic bombs used by the USSR were still powerful but relatively low yield. The first one used to seal off a burning gas well in 1966 near Bukhara in Uzbekistan was a 30-kiloton bomb. (The Hiroshima bomb was 20 kilotons. The US B53 nuclear bomb, its most powerful warhead, could yield 9,000 kilotons.)

From what I've seen of BP and its cohorts in this disaster, Halliburton and Transocean, I don't want them near any nukes. BP -- British Petroleum -- used to promote itself in ad as a green company, saying it was investing in alternative energy sources such as biofuels, hydrogen and solar power.

But as noted in a New York Times article, "Despite its new sunburst logo and 'Beyond Petroleum' slogan, BP still invests $12 billion, or 25 times more, on oil and gas than on its wind and solar division for the simple fact that, right now, there's a huge market for oil and almost none for solar panels." ("How Green Is BP?" December 8, 2002). Later on it decided to "throw in the towel" with its alternative energy efforts (businessinsider.com - Feb. 5, 2009). So much for its new green and yellow sunburst logo.

Besides BP's dodgy use of advertising to influence public opinion, take a look at the explosion back in March 2005 at its Texas City refinery. 15 workers killed, 150 others injured. Why? Because BP, to save money and increase profits, cut back on maintenance and safety costs, the decision being traced back to the Powers-That-Be in London.

So no nukes for BP. Unless you want to go to Louisiana and look at tar balls glowing in the dark.

Beyond Petroleum, their ass.

2010-05-15T01:33:00.003-04:00

XR #72

Available for download at http://www.xrayer.com . Scroll down to the PDF archives.

Now to wait and see how well the hardcopy version, the digest-sized edition I sent without an envelope, made it through the snail mail system.

2010-05-08T23:00:00.008-04:00

Review: Stanton T. Friedman Is Real

What's with the organ music?

Opening scene, "Stanton T. Friedman Is Real." The doc's subject is standing at a podium, speaking at the 2001 MUFON conference. In the background a musical selection is played, added post-production, the kind of tonal atmosphere one would hear at an old time tent revival decades ago in rural USA.

I suspected why Paul Kimball, the documentarian, picked that particular piece. I'm not surprised when later on an interviewee refers to Stan as an "evangelist."

But despite that editorial musical commentary, STFIR is a balanced documentary, showing different POVs regarding Stan's work and the ufological field in general. I was an "informed viewer" going in, i.e., I was familiar with the subject matter. But the doc still held my interest; I learned all sorts of new stuff.

Also, it's doubtful I'll ever make to Roswell during one of its goofy Crash Festivals, but STFIR shows some scenes giving a viewer a feel for the place and its cash cow event.

Paul does have an eye for recording or setting up a scene. Yes, there are some staged ones -- Stan walking down the middle of an empty road in the middle of nowhere, straight towards the camera on the pavement -- but such scenes do work. Paul also engages in other cinematic tricks, tilting the camera or presenting scenes in black-and-white, but these tricks enhance, not detract from, the doc. Let's face it: a documentary with only talking heads, one interviewee after another giving his opinion, can be boring, despite how interesting the comments may be.

Among those interviewed are Kevin Randle and the late Karl Pflock, familiar names in the UFO field. Like I said before, I was already interested in the topic, having read and researched saucer stuff for many years. I wonder how well this doc would play to someone with little knowledge of ufology. Would it hold their attention? STFIR does move along at a good pace and as noted does have a few visual tricks so maybe it would play well to a general audience.

Also, Stan's personality comes through, especially during the segments of his lectures. Talking about "the Cosmic Watergate," Stan holds up some government materials he gathered through the Freedom Of Information Act, pages of redacted sections, each page almost completely covered by black boxes. Useless to a researcher. Such a presentation does play well to a general audience.

So how did Paul Kimball convince Stan to be in this documentary? One could call it nepotism: Stan is Paul's uncle. I'm not knocking it. The avuncular relationship probably helped to put Stan at ease during the filming, letting his personality shine through.

But there is one question left unanswered for me. How did Stan react to the doc? After the first viewing, did he turn to Paul in the screening room and ask:

"Hey, nephew, what's with the organ music?"

(In case the above link is missing or broken, "Stanton T. Friedman Is Real" can be viewed on You Tube.)

2010-05-08T22:58:00.002-04:00

Hey, Kids – Wanna Drive Yourself Insane?

So this time around I decided to format the hardcopy version of my zine as a digest.

For those of you unfamiliar with zining, a digest-formatted zine is when you take 8 1/2 X 11 paper, turn it sideways, fold it down the middle, and staple it along the crease. It looks neat but there’s a downside. How to you get the pages in the proper sequence?

Four sheets folded convert into an 8 page edition. Not only do the pages have to be out of sequence to be in the proper sequence, you have to make sure each double-side sheet has the correct pages on each side. For eXample, this means sheet A has to have pages 8 and 1 on one side, then pages 2 and 7 on the flip side.

I wanted to do all the formatting on my computer instead of printing out the pages in sequence, then taping or gluing them down as I did in the past. I think I’ve figured it all out, no mess lying around my desk, paper trimmings, but what an eXcruciating HEADACHE I got! Now I have to make sure to print everything in the right sequence or I’ll have a fatal migraine.

The upside to the digest format: I can address each copy on my computer with a plain sheet of paper instead of messing around with envelopes. Word allows me to type in addresses sideways, perfect for the format.

2010-05-04T01:14:00.001-04:00

Papernet: MY ZINE

Should you ever tell a zinester what to do? Fuhgeddaboudit. Especially if that zinester is Fred Argoff, creator of the paper zine Brooklyn!

In B! #68 -- which just arrived via snail mail -- Fred has an essay entitled YOUR FRIENDLY LOCAL NEANDERTHAL which addresses the issue of paper versus photons.

He explains that a couple of people have told him that his zine should go digital instead of being exclusively hardcopy. One person stated that Fred was wasting his time with B! because it wasn't being produced as an e-zine.

Fred's response is summed up in two words: MY ZINE. As in, this is my zine, not yours.

As he explains: "You want to read your zines off a computer screen? Go right ahead. But for long as there is a zine called Brooklyn! it shall be produced on paper."

His zine. His call.

I agree with him. If you don't like what he's doing, then start an ezine about Brooklyn.

Me, I'm both paper and photons. I blog first, then collect some of my posts into a paper zine. For me online has priority, then the hardcopy comes later. That's how I work as a zinester. Other creators have their own priorities.

The reason why most zinesters end up doing what they do is because they're fed up with gatekeepers and critics. Gatekeepers, editors and publishers who subjectively deem the good and the unworthy. Critics, those who can't create but sure can criticize. Sometimes there isn't much difference between the two categories.

Zinesters both online and offline can bypass all the bullshit. Individuality can stand out; homogenized crap no longer rules.

Sure, you can suggest something to a zinester, make a helpful comment, ask a question. Just don't tell him what he should do.

If something is that important, do it yourself. And maybe after see you all the effort that is involved, you'll start to appreciate the labors of a creator.

(Contact Fred Argoff at 1170 Ocean Parkway, Penthouse L, Brooklyn, NY 11230-4040.)

2010-05-02T04:27:00.004-04:00

No Accidents: It's All A Conspiracy

Interesting tidbits from the latest gathering of the Liberty Net that started on Saturday night, May 1, around 10 PM and carried into Sunday morning.

(For those of you unaware of this net, it is a weekly on air meeting of ham radio operators in the US who share extreme right-wing views.)

A main topic: the tremendous oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. It was emphasized that the offshore rig explosion occurred on Earth Day. Of course, that can't be a coincidence, say a few of the LibNet gang. The Mega-Conspiracy must have planned the explosion and the resulting spill for that particular date.

It's all a plot by President Obama, claimed a LibNetter, to push liberal green energy sources over traditional ones. How else can you turn the public against new offshore drilling?

Also the contrived spill forces this country to use oil under the control of China. Obama, of course, is really a communist, he serves his red masters, at least not when he's working for Islamic terrorists.

I heard the Liberty Net via an audio stream on a stickcam.com site. The site also includes a running chat session that parallels the broadcast. Online commenters blamed the usual suspects for the oil rig disaster. Russia, China, or "the HEEBS" must've "torpedoed" the platform.

But most of the action was still on air, especially when it came to connecting the dots. That recent coal mine explosion in West Virginia -- the Mega-Con had to be behind that to get people against coal. See how it all fits together?

What's next on the secret agenda of the Mega-Con? One LibNetter said an explosion at a nuclear power plant.

So if by some chance a nuke plant does have problems, it isn't an accident: it's a calculated move by the Mega-Con.

Subscribe to the LibNet POV and you'll believe accidents never happen. There is never an element of chance; everything is mapped out by the great shadowy powers that control our fates.

I suppose if I could have the same mindset, then the world would be easier place to deal with. No disturbing gray to challenge me.

2010-05-01T22:26:00.006-04:00

Facebook Crosspost SNAFU

Facebook is still not crossposting from this blog. So I'll just paste links over there for those you like to use FB as a central info service. But there are other options.

http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=337187

Just click on above link, sign up, and FeedBlitz will deliver my posts to your email account. I've used it for some time now and no problems.

http://www.google.com/reader

No problems with Google Reader so far. You can follow your favorite sites all in one place. I also use Bloglines but have been having trouble with it. Sometimes it gets wonky. Check out the box on the right side of my blog, Subscribe To Ray's X-Blog. Other services besides Google are available.

There is also Google Friend Connect. I'm not familiar with it, never took the time to use it, but it allows you become a follower of a blog.

So keep up the great work, Facebook. It's not like users are completely stuck with your service.

2010-05-01T02:26:00.002-04:00

Notable Points: TJ And The Star Fleet

At ufodigest.com contributor TJ Morris has posted another intriguing article with concepts spanning from the metaverse to the xenoverse. Such a sweeping span would boggle the average reader but TJ puts her cosmic concepts into personal terms, showing how they relate to her earthly existence. She admits her experiences sound like science fiction but insists they are true.

Entitled "TJ Morris Shares The Andromeda Galaxy Star Fleet," I gleaned these fascinating details from her essay:

> In a previous existence TJ lived in the Andromeda galaxy.

> Here on Gaia (planet Earth in the Milky Way galaxy) she searched out other intelligences beyond this world through meditation and prayer.

> She's now in contact with the Andromeda Star Fleet hovering over our world, a global fleet of 27 different species.

> She and the intelligences of the Star Fleet will work with quantum scientists to explain exobiology and existentialism to the people of Gaia.

> Andromedians can communicate through common speech or by telepathy. Their telepathic range is about six feet on our planet.

> TJ has trained for this work in both reality and dream state.

Here is the link to her article.

2010-05-01T02:19:00.002-04:00

Time Suck

I wasted about an hour yesterday trying to get the crosspost app at Facebook to automatically include posts from this blog. The feature worked OK until recently; it just stopped without warning.

I'm not a Facebook fan but some people check out all their stuff there and so I used crossposting to make it more convenient for them to follow my thoughts.

Someone (Hat Tip: Doug) told me that the app would work again if you reset it. But with all the digital knowledge crammed into my head, I couldn't remember how to access the crosspost feature.

Of course, Facebook's Help was useless. I managed to find the answer via Google and even that took some time. When I did access the proper Facebook page, the link box I needed was missing. Taking a chance, I clicked on Page 2 and the link finally appeared on that page. Convenient, easy to access Facebook. I've heard complaints that changing the privacy settings involves even more hoops to jump through.

Now to see if this post will go through. If not, I'll do it the old-fashioned way, pasting the link in at Facebook.

Computers suck time!!

And as a time suck, Facebook is the worse. Don't be surprised to see me disappear from there.

I should be researching and writing, not trying to figure out nonsense.

2010-04-18T04:52:00.002-04:00

Semi-Dead Shortwave

Propagation usually sucks when I try to tune in the Saturday night gathering of the Liberty Net. Now I listen via a streaming website run by one of the Lib Netters. On some nights conditions are so bad that even the amateur radio operators participating in the net have problems hearing each other, despite their pro equipment.

But even if propagation conditions were good, shortwave radio overall is dying out. International broadcasters like the BBC in England, DW in Germany and Radio Netherlands have stopped transmitting their programs to the US. One excuse for cutting back is that people can listen on their home computers via streaming.

I still enjoy listening to a radio but the stations that have remained on the air, Radio Australia and Radio New Zealand International, are being affected by the lousy listening conditions. So once again I turn to streaming audio on my computer. I want to hear what other countries are saying.

They say the sunspot cycle is on the upswing, meaning improved SW reception conditions. But for the most part the only stations that come in that well are domestic US ones like WWCR which broadcast Xtian and superpatriot - conspiracy programs. Even then I've had problems with those broadcasters.

Gee, maybe HAARP up there in Alaska is trying to cut off all outside contact and is also selectively squelching some local stations.

Six Degrees Of The Liberty Net

I did some more Googling and found a site that archives audio files of the Liberty Net gatherings. As I mentioned before, the Lib Net is a group of ham radio operators who discuss current events but with a superpatriot focus. At times some racism shows through.

So it didn't surprise me that the site archiving the Saturday night gatherings, http://3950.net/, was under the auspices of Kevin Alfred Strom, a man described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as "a bookish yet dogmatic neo-Nazi whose predilection for child pornography ultimately ruined his efforts to claim his former master's legacy." That former master was the late William Pierce, founder of the neo-Nazi organization the National Alliance.

As for Strom's problems with child porn, he maintains his innocence, saying he was set up. His wife, Elisha Strom, says she found child porn on his computer and that's why she turned him in to the authorities.

Kevin Strom faced two separate trials. He prevailed with the first one held in 2007, found innocent of trying to entice a minor into performing sex acts. But with the second trial in January 2008, Strom struck a deal, pleading guilty to possession of child pornography so that multiple counts of receiving child porn were dismissed. During his sentencing Strom contended that he didn't intentionally download child porn, it came from an online forum he had visited. He wrapped up his prison stretch in September 2008 but still faced 15 years of supervised release.

At his website Strom under his Marginalia section thanks the European Union Times for its support during his "travails." I never heard of the European Union Times so I did some more searching and found the editorial comment that defended Strom. Placed at the end of an article about Strom pleading guilty to child porn, the editor stated:

"Kevin is innocent and he is a victim of the ZOG Empire! He only pleads guilty so he won’t get the maximum sentence!

"He dedicated all his life fighting against: pornography, child pornography, rape, murder, race mixing, suppression, homosexuality, etc! How could they even accuse him with such nonsense?? It’s well known that they placed some pictures with naked children in his computer…"

ZOG refers to the Zionist Occupation Government, a key component of many anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.

Is it me or do I sense a pattern here?

2010-04-14T17:09:00.002-04:00

Matthew Graeber: A Sketch

It started with an UFO sighting when he was around twelve years old.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. August 1953. A hot muggy night. Unable to sleep, young Matthew Graeber sat on the edge of his bed, his elbows on the window sill, chin tucked on his hands. Despite the darkness the view outside his window was well-lit by the ambient illumination of street lights.

A mysterious globe appeared in the sky, glowing with a radiance suggestive of a full moon. As it turned it took on the appearance of a disc-shaped object. Whatever it was, it quickly disappeared into the distance like a TV set being shut off, the image fading into a tiny white dot before being swallowed by the blackness.

He mentioned the brief sighting (about six seconds duration) to his mother, asking her if they should report it to the Air Force. She replied maybe next time if he saw it again.

The event piqued his interest. Matt read everything he could on the subject of "flying saucers," as they were called in the early days of ufology.

Years passed and he ended up investigating reports for other witnesses as part of the Philadelphia-based UFO Report and Information Center (UFORIC) from 1972 - 1980. The six member civilian organization was responsible for covering the Tri-State area of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware, conducting field investigations and interviews with witnesses.

One aspect of UFORIC's investigations was to see if there was any connections between witnesses and their biorhythmic cycles.

This focus on witnesses as well as the sightings is reflected in Matt's psychological approach to UFO cases. While not ruling out that some UFO sightings could involve ET craft or some sort of paranormal activity, Matt considers the mindset of the observer as an important factor.

He believes that two types of psychological situations might be involved in a sighting: Dynamic Display (DD) and Dual Process of Perception (DPP).

This is how Matt defines each category (e-mail dated 4/1/10):

"Dynamic Display involves an interruption of (waking state) consciousness by some sort of visually perceived external stimuli, and adverse latent psychical contents are reduced in intensity because of a function of excessive libido transference ( i.e., a D. D.).

"Dual Process of Perception (DPP) involves and over-laying if internally generated (dream state imagery) upon the external environment. The mixture of inner and outer world elements are perceived (in the waking state) as one."

An example of Dynamic Display would be the observer seeing symbolism in objects he perceives as UFOs. In one case Matt investigated a man observed four UFOs in the daytime sky, three on his left and one to his right. In terms of D.D. the grouping of three could represent the man's family, his estranged wife and two children, while the fourth one could symbolize the relationship with his new girlfriend.

As for Dual Process of Perception, Matt examined a report of a mini-saucer encounter and evaluated it in terms of D.P.P. The witness was in bed, half-awake, eyes open. The man perceived the room around him while dreaming that a small UFO had flown through an open window.

Matt's psychological take was influenced by reading Freud and also the book "Flying Saucers: A Modern Myth of Things Seen in the Skies" by C. G. Jung (1959).

Since UFO investigations don't pay that well -- if at all -- Matt had his "day job" of being a commercial artist. Due to his failing eyesight he has retired from both his commercial art pursuits and UFO investigations. He writes occasional articles for the online newsletter, SUNlite.

2010-04-08T00:14:00.004-04:00

XR #71

It's up at http://www.xrayer.com -- the latest edition of my zine, The Ray X X-Rayer (PDF file). XR #71 features posts from this blog in a convenient-to-print format. There is some new material in the intro, a couple of items I haven't written about here. So before they get too old -- and before I forget -- here are those items...

Hot Gas, Northern Lights & UFOS

Ever see the Northern Lights? When the sun is active it throws off a CME (Coronal Mass Ejection) that hits the earth's magnetic field and -- Voila! -- the aurora is produced. (Good thing I proofread this stuff. I had written "Viola!")

Over at her blog, The Orange Orb, Regan Lee discussed the sighting of a triangular UFO one night in West Linn, Oregon. The observer contacted local media but was unable to speak to any live people except one at a TV station. The station employee replied "that's kind of funny that you'd report that today because it's the Spring Equinox and you could have seen a reflection from the Northern Lights."

As I mentioned in my comment at Regan's blog, the sun has been quiet until recently, not many sunspots. I wondered if the Northern Lights were active that night. If they were, from what I've seen of them south of the Canadian border, they're usually not that bright to reflect off anything. Maybe the TV station employee meant to say the aurora was "reflecting" off the earth's atmosphere. Either way, the witness saw a solid object. While I didn't know if he actually saw an alien craft, the aurora explanation didn't wash.

As for the Spring Equinox and Northern Lights connection -- that makes as much sense as saying "It's Easter and what you saw is a meteor." Just like meteor showers and holidays, the aurora isn't dependent on the Spring Equinox.

Another comparison: The first day of spring doesn't mean sunny skies and warm temps immediately start. I've seen it snow around here in May.

If you're going to give explanations, try to at least make them based in real science, not in half-science.

In a follow up post Regan compares the Northern Lights explanation to the old swamp gas disinfo. Me, the aurora explanation is like a CME -- a lot of hot gas.

Liberty Net Online

As I just mentioned in the prior item, the sun has been really quiet until recently. Not only does it result in the lack of Northern Lights, it also means usually lousy shortwave reception. When the sun isn't sleeping, sunspots are frequent and SW conditions are improved.

For years I've followed a gathering of superpatriot ham radio operators in the 75 meter band, LSB (lower sideband mode). They usually meet on Saturday nights, kicking off at around 10 PM EST. The last couple of weeks I've barely picked them up on 3.953 MHz.

So I Googled and found an audio stream for the Lib Net at http://www.stickam.com/TheLibertyNet . It sure beats listening to faint voices and static.

Be advised that a few of the Lib Netters express bigoted / racially insensitive views. I don't agree with most of their views; I track them to hear what's getting the superpatriot community so riled up lately. (Health care, anyone?)

2010-03-29T02:28:00.004-04:00

Straight Scoop On Twisty Subjects

Cults, Conspiracies, & Secret Societies: The Straight Scoop on Freemasons, The Illuminati, Skull & Bones, Black Helicopters, The New World Order, and many, many more by Arthur Goldwag. Vintage Books/Random House 2009.

Ever wonder about those shadowy groups that want to run -- or maybe are running -- the world? The Council on Foreign Relations, the Illuminati, that ilk? Or maybe you want to learn more about less nefarious organizations like Woodmen of the World.

Try Cults, Conspiracies, & Secret Societies by Arthur Goldwag. He acts as a knowledgeable guide through the convoluted historical mazes of non-mainstream organizations. This non-fiction book is easy-to-read, easy-to-grok, but not so easy to use as a reference.

CC&SS is broken down into the three general categories mentioned in the title. Of course, this is Goldwag's personal organization. You might think a subject should be under Cults but it's actually included in Conspiracies or Secret Societies. He provides a list of topics in the front of the book so that you can scan and cross-reference a particular topic when it pops up in another entry.

For example, you're reading along about Area 51 and see the Trilateral Commission mentioned in bold print, indicating the subject has its own entry. It takes some page flipping to locate it in the List of Topics because you have to scan through each of the three main categories. Eventually you find Trilateral Commission under "Secret Societies."

A traditional index in the back of the book with everything listed straight from A - Z would've work better but there isn't one. Another way to save on searching would be to follow a bold print cross-reference with its page number in parentheses. Sorry, but I'm been spoiled using online hypertext links. And if this book is ever digitalized, it should offer links to the topics within its manuscript.

Despite that flaw, CC&SS is still a ripping good read, even with its occasional lumpiness.

Sometimes Goldwag might go off on a riff and lump some subjects under one entry. You'll encounter articles such as "Area 51, Stealth Blimps, Majestic-12, Alien Abductions, and Divine Revelations" and "Black Helicopters, Men in Black, Michigan Militias, Cattle Mutilations, and Liars' Clubs." Despite such rambling he ties it all together with his readable style.

Goldwag states in his introduction that his book is "exploratory rather than encyclopedic," meaning that he is more interested in finding connections between topics than just strictly itemizing the groups and theories he reviews.

His fair-minded approach reminds me of "Kooks," the classic book by Donna Kossy. Like Kossy, Goldwag doesn't engage in vehement attacks on fringe beliefs, unlike some militant skeptics who have covered the same territory with scorched earth campaigns.