I subscribe to many blogs and newsletters and am sent many forwards but one of the clearest communicators is a historian and comedian. Steve Behrman entertains as Swami Beyondananda and writes visionary articles on his blog, Notes from the Trail. This post reveals the clarity and brilliance of his mind and heart and is something you may want to print out and keep on hand as well as forward to everyone on your mailing list. For me, it is like Paul Revere’s ride alerting citizens that the British were coming. But this time, Steve is helping to wake us up to the big picture and strategies that can help turn things around. I am grateful to call Steve a friend and a true political and social visionary. If you have not read Spontaneous Evolution, his book written with Bruce Lipton, you may want to pick up a copy or purchase the CD. Steve has an important and timely message that will continue unfolding into 2012 and beyond. Enjoy and act.

And, if you feel moved by Steve’s words, please consider joining me in becoming a paid subscriber. Steve recently left his home and embarked on a mobile tour. He can use all the support we can give him.

“It’s time to emerge from fear and separation, see we are all one with the same One, and gather under one big intent.”
–Swami Beyondananda

It’s been ten years since the Twin Towers attacks initiated the never-ending War on Terror. In the Orwellian logic that can only take hold in an atmosphere of fear, we have been collectively “convinced” that only totalitarianism can preserve our freedom. However, there is a deep awakening afoot, an “evolutionary upwising” as people from all sides emerge from the matrix of politics as usual to seek real answers, and more importantly ask real questions. For as some wise person once suggested, if we don’t ask different questions, we can never get different answers.

So, in this brief reflection on a world-changing moment, I suggest we ask ourselves three questions:

What’s so?

So what?

Now what?

What’s So?

There has been much speculation about what really happened on 9/11, and many well-respected individuals from across the political spectrum have called for a re-investigation of the original investigation. Certainly there are enough unanswered questions (not to mention unquestioned answers) to cast doubt on the official narrative.

There’s at least one new book that explores anomalies in the official story and former Senator Mike Gravel (D-Alaska) is now at the forefront of a campaign to put the call for a new investigation on the ballot in California.

Meanwhile, the progressive and conservative mainstream continue to dismiss any alternative stories about what happened that day as “conspiracy theories.” I have often said that a “conspiracy theory” is something which, were it true, most people couldn’t deal with. I see the “dismissal attacks” as defensive maneuvers to keep us from facing the horrific possibility that we were betrayed by elements in our own government and ruling elite. Meanwhile, there is a certain personality archetype that thrives on conspiracy theories, and those of us who are not that type tend to be repelled by the darkness and negativity.

But since this article is about shifting our perspective from a state of emergency to a state of emergent seeing, let’s put aside for a moment the speculation about what might have happened, and let’s instead focus on what we all know did happen. In the days following the attacks, America had the sympathy of the entire world and along with it the potential to initiate a truly healthy new world order. Consider the (largely unreported) response of Norwegians to the recent right-wing terrorist attack in their country. Some 200,000 people – 20% of the population of Oslo – gathered to silently reaffirm that the attack would only make them more determined to create a loving and peaceful society.

In contrast, the Bush Administration on behalf of the corporate state used the attacks pretty much as Hitler used the Reichstag Fire – to mobilize the country into a “religious war” against terrorists. (I am reminded of the quote from writer / actor Peter Ustinov that “Terrorism is the war of the poor, and war is the terrorism of the rich.”) Less than 48 hours after the 9/11 attacks – before there had been any real investigation of the who, what or why — President Bush addressed an audience at the National Cathedral in Washington, and in the presence of a minister, priest, rabbi and mullah declared the “war on terror.” Until that time, no American war had ever been declared in a house of worship. (Theologian David Ray Griffin has some very astute insights into the psychological reasons for doing that and I refer you to this article I wrote about him five years ago.)

So What?

So what? So what are the implications of our government’s response to the Twin Tower attacks? The first wave of response to the attacks was the passage of the U.S.A. Patriot Act (emphasis on “act”). In the guise of acting patriotic, a panicked and manipulated Congress voted for a 342-page bill that none of them had even read. While a few legislators stubbornly refused to sign freedom’s death warrant, a little anthrax in the mail was all that was needed to change their minds. Interestingly, a document produced in the late 1990′s by a neoconservative think tank, Project for a New American Century declared that what was needed was “a new Pearl Harbor” to convince ordinary Americans to sign up for the perpetual warfare state.

But that was just the beginning. Once a critical mass of the uncritical masses bought in to this ultimate protection racket, the unofficial powers behind the official ones recognized they had carte blanche to act on their own behalf and hide behind “national security.” In the decade since the Towers came down, we have seen an endless war in Afghanistan, and a tragic and costly one in Iraq. When that war began, those who questioned it (e.g., Phil Donohue) were simply taken off the air. The press became cheerleaders for a war that had nothing to do with protection of America and Americans and everything to do with perpetuating the warfare state and the oil empire.

Someone remarked several years ago that the difference between Pravda and the American press is that Soviet citizens knew they were being lied to. Never before in the history of this country have the parameters of official conversation been so narrow. In true and frightening Orwellian fashion, truth has become “privatized” as left and right are served up separate and conflicting stories to insure they remain … separate and conflicting. Regardless of the intent of the 9/11 attacks, regardless of who was behind them, the result has been a structure that has effectively divided, conquered and immobilized the American people.

Until now …
Now What?

The good news is the body politic is finally emerging from its torpid slumber. Both the Tea Party movement and the growing ranks of progressives undergoing “hopium” withdrawal, signal an awakening to a more ominous emergency: Our democratic republic is rapidly sliding down the slippery slope toward totalitarianism. This acknowledgment, while initially difficult to face, is ultimately empowering. Because the first step in healing a condition is acknowledging it. Or, in Swami’s words, “The truth shall upset you free.”

And how do we face this emergency? First by emerging from fear and separation and seeing that despite our divisions, the American people are deeply united on one thing: What we have now isn’t working and the predators on Wall Street have overpowered the producers on Main Street. Progressives blame corporations, conservatives rail against the state … and continuing the conversation at the level of bipolar “politics as usual” will only exacerbate the emergency. However, if we emerge from the polarized political puppet show, we see “the man behind the curtain” is the corporate state – the power of enormous financial leverage combined with the coercive power of a government-for-hire with the power to legislate “illegal” laws.

As more and more Americans are awakening to these inconvenient truths, we must arise to yet another emergent seeing: As Einstein famously said, a problem cannot be solved with the same thinking that created it. So if we merely replace the old villain (Muslim extremists) with the new one (the Corporate State), we’re missing the holistic message and are buying into the same “assaholic” model that brought us to where we are today.

Instead of seeing the “sociopathogens” that have been afflicting the body politic as individuals or even groups of individuals, it’s far more helpful to see them as fields of beliefs and behaviors – that are fed by our own fears, unhealed wounds and programmed beliefs. Consider that while Enron was a sociopathic entity, not everyone who worked for that company was a sociopath. However, to keep their job they had to engage in sociopathic behavior. So, the emergent awakening is that we have allowed the amoral sociopathic credo of the rule of gold (“Doodoo unto others before they can doodoo unto you”) to overrule the Golden Rule.

As Bruce Lipton and I point out in Spontaneous Evolution, when religion ceased to be the dominant force in our civilization, because “human nature abhors a moral vacuum,” the raw power of “the 3 M’s” (Materialism, Money and the Machine) came in to fill the breach. While old-fashioned religionists on the right and progressive communitarians on the left both see the problem, because we have been so divided into warring camps, we haven’t until now been able to unite and stand for the virtues and values that the 90% of us who aren’t sociopaths would choose to live by.

Yes, it’s challenging and frustrating to hear the “other side” attack our side through misunderstandings, stereotypes, lies and distortions. But perhaps it’s time to rise to yet another emergent seeing: Instead of “fighting their liars,” it’s time to gather around a larger and more powerful truth. As Jesus said, “Resist not evil” – meaning, we find far more true power in standing for something than fighting against.

Swami For Precedent: A 3-Step Program

Seven years ago, I wrote a book and launched a campaign called Swami for Precedent. No, it wasn’t a campaign to get my alter ego elected President. Rather it was to choose a new “precedent”: Government of the people, by the people and for the people, where the government does our bidding, not the bidding of the highest bidder. Essentially, it was a campaign to elect ourselves – to recognize that only by evolving from passive children of God to proactive adults of God could we bring goodness to earth. It grew out of the spiritually mature realization that we are not victims of a wrathful God or a random Universe, but aware and awake co-creators of our world.

At the time, we subtitled the book “A 7-Step Plan to Heal the Body Politic and Cure Electile Dysfunction” because there was no time for 12 steps. Well now, seven years down the line we’ve boiled it town to three steps:

Wake up laughing.
Wise up loving.
Show up growing.

As more and more of us are awakening to realize, before there can be political evolution, there must be spiritual and psychological evolution. And while not everyone needs to awaken at the same level, those at the leading edge of this new paradigm must gather together under One Big Intent – to live the principle at the core of every religious, spiritual and ethical path, the Golden Rule, and to express what Integral philosopher Steve McIntosh calls The Natural Theology: truth, beauty and goodness.

While these ideas may seem abstract, they become very real as we set an intention as individuals, communities, nations and as One Humanity to bring them to life. My personal mission is to use comedy and laughter as a “people tenderizer” that releases us from rigid and obsolete beliefs, and attunes us to curiosity and new possibilities. When we “wake up laughing,” we find the “aha” in the wake of the “ha-ha,” and see the ironic joke that we have held the key to our own liberation all along.

And as levity lifts us to a higher seeing, we recognize that “love” is more than a nicey-nicey feel good word, but the very glue that holds our Universe together. And from this universal, outside-the-matrix view, we can see beyond both religion and non-religion to the perennial truth: One Spirit, Many Paths. While some dogmas insist there is a God, and others that there isn’t, the one thing everyone can agree on is that there is a power of Good. Even in the most dire of human circumstances – from natural disasters like hurricanes to unnatural ones like warfare – the power of Good is always present, and seeing that good always inspires us. Since the root of the word “inspire” is “infused with Spirit,” if Good is inspiring, well goodness gracious, Good is as good as God.

Once we’ve freed the mind through laughter, and opened the heart with love … we have to show up growing. We have to use our will, our hands and our whole physical beings to embrace change and take the next evolutionary step. Whether we like it or not, we are finding circumstances tearing us from the safe harbors of comfort and complacency. We cannot pretend that our warfare state is a benevolent father who will care for our welfare and protection. Nor can we rely on comforting clichés that make us right and others wrong, but don’t fundamentally change the game.

We must now become the new precedent – awakened, aware, proactive adults of God (or if you prefer, Good) willing to laugh at our own shadow, and courageous enough to risk standing for the world we know is possible rather than merely railing at perceived villains. May 2012 be a precedential year, where the emperor’s buttocks are revealed – but we the people turn the other cheek as well, shifting our attention from fighting disease in the body politic, toward building health.

May a new “movement of movements” emerge, where a new order arises from the grassroots up, and we strengthen the fields of truth, beauty and goodness, and the sociopathogens die from starvation. For as Swami has said, “The only way to overgrow big brother is through bigger brotherhood – and sisterhood.” Only by seeing that we are all brothers and sisters in the same ‘hood can we transform the current state of emergency to an ever-growing state of emergent seeing.

Curious about Swami’s upcoming Precedential Campaign for 2012? Just respond to this email and put “Precedent” in the subject line.

Become a paid subscriber / supporter of Notes From the Trail here.

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At 15, as he sat in an algebra math class watching his teacher demonstrate an equation, Emmanuel Itier converted the numbers to words in his head that formed a poem. That night he had a dream about the poem that gave birth to his existential script, The Cage, about a man’s mid-life crisis. He thought to himself that he should turn it into a film and recruited a few friends, one of whom had a video camera to shoot the short film in 24 hours. He showed the dark film with lots of blood to his father who was a doctor and mother, a teacher. After watching it they said “Emmanuel, you’re very creative and it looks like you won’t become a doctor or teacher, so go do what you are called to do.”

After The Cage, Emmanuel produced a few other short films and upon graduating high school he spent a week in film class at a local college in Paris and immediately sensed he could do better on his own. He left and got a job in sales for a cable company while simultaneously interning for production companies.

About this time, he met an American flight attendant, a relationship developed and they were married and moved to US in 1988. Upon arriving in Hollywood, Emmanuel spoke no English, nor had he any real credentials ,so he did odd jobs until he began teaching French to Hollywood film executives one of whom, Peter Hoffman, the CFO of Carolco, the production company responsible for Rambo, Basic Instinct and other action films, befriended and mentored him. He learned the ropes by observing and reading scripts and self-trained to become a producer. During his teaching days, a Paris friend contacted him and asked if would like to be a US correspondent for a French film magazine to which he said yes.

Emmanuel went on to produce ten films and direct three, many of which were low budget horror films made because the Hollywood financiers were essentially “unconscious, making films for unconscious audiences”.

After ten years, Emmanuel remarried, had his first child, and had a second revelation. He heard a voice say “You need to do something with your life”

A few minutes later, the idea of oneness popped into his mind and his first conscious film, Invocation was born. Invocation answers the question, “What’s the meaning of existence?” In his mind, Emmanuel heard narration by Sharon Stone and pursued her for 3 years. When they finally met, she read the script and told him that the film was very important and should be seen by every member of Congress and screened at the Smithsonian. When he told her he had no money left, she told him that was not a problem and that she would be honored to narrate. She became the Executive Producer and will share in any profits.

The film has been screened at twenty festivals winning six awards and has received great feedback from luminaries including director Oliver Stone and Nobel Laureate Desmond Tutu both of whom appear in the film.

While watching his engaging and important film, I was taken on an journey through the minds of a wonderful group of people from many walks of life who illuminated many areas of great interest to me and NPD readers including peace, mystery, awakening, the material and spiritual, science and religion, consciousness and non-locality, I and We, and silence.

Among the many powerful quotes in the film is this one: The terrorism of the strong brings about the terrorism of the weak. And it’s opposite may well be true. The peacefulness of the strong could bring about the peacefulness of the weak. It’s an idea whose time has come. The underlying message of this film is that we must come to see the divine everywhere and in everyone we see for we and life are one seamless whole however it may look and we may then, finally, realize the peace we seek in ourselves and the world.

Photos are Emannuel with Puppet Ji, Desmond Tutu and Sharon Stone.

“So far, we haven’t come far in solving our deeper cultural problems but we can do a lot”, says Itier, if, we focus on action rather than what’s wrong. The way I see it, humanity is not failing but is rather reinventing itself. There’s been far too much talking and thinking. Many more of us need to put the idea of peace into action and actually become it.

What took place historically is what Emmanuel calls the “castration of the feminine” by and in the masculine. “For the past 10,000 years. we have been the victims of a controlling masculine dominated system that directed women away from their power and positions of power and, at the same time, also killed the feminine in the head and hearts of men and turned them into killers rather than lovers

To help reconcile this dangerous historical split, Emmanuel is completing production of his next film, Femme: Women Healing the World featuring visionaries including Nobel Peace Prize Winners Shirin Ebadi and Mairead Maguire and modern day visionaries Barbara Marx Hubbard, Riane Eisler, Jean Houston, Jean Shinoda Bolen, and Marianne Williamson. And, Yoko Ono contributed a song for the film.

“Today”, Emmanuel says, “we have a group of serial killers and psychopaths in charge of the planet. A re-balancing is underway, so I have been called to produce my trilogy of Invocation, Femme and the last, We Come in Peace: A Re-Evolution of Economics and Politics that integrates the themes of oneness and the reunion of the feminine and masculine in all of us and applies this union to a vision of a transcended economics and politics in action.

Emmanuel is a man on a passionate mission of peace and film is his vehicle of love. I look forward to reviewing Femme and Come in Peace for NPD the minute they become available. Should you wish to support the making of his next two films, please contact Emmanuel through his production company’s website http://www.redefinegod.com or at wl1@cox.net.

My friend Steve Bhaerman aka Swami Beyondananda began his professional career as a history teacher, became a comic and, most recently, has placed his knowledge, wisdom, vision and heart along with his comedic talent in the service of evolving the conversation around politics to tap the genius of we the people. His partner in this mighty work is Joseph McCormick and together they have authored a book for our time, Reuniting America:  A Manifesto For Changing the Political Game that is now ready for prime time in the form of a print version of their successful e-book.

In a time when politics appears nothing more than a Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dumb affair and a lost cause and when it looks like we have the best government money can buy, the philosophy and activism they have begun sharing with diverse and empowered audiences is both refreshing and hopeful and absolutely worth a try.

Steve and Joseph need funding to complete their book and road show and if you agree their efforts are worth supporting, please join me in donating what you can afford to accelerate this emerging political paradigm. I will keep you posted on their progress. Perhaps we will finally understand and release the power of a United State of Us.

 

 

 

 

 

“….it was the story of a mighty vision given to a man too weak to use it; of a holy tree that should have flourished in a people’s heart with flowers and singing birds, and now is withered; and of a people’s dream that died in bloody snow. But if the vision was true and mighty, as I know, it is true and mighty yet; for such things are of the spirit, and it is in the darkness of their eyes that men get lost.”

– Black Elk

“There are no sides, only angles … and when we see things from the proper angle, we see we are all on the same side.”

– Swami Beyondananda

 

Back in the early 70s, Steve Bhaerman lived in a commune he and friends playfully called The Embassy of Atlantis because of its simultaneous location on Embassy Row in Washington, D.C. and in a parallel reality.

In the early 1980s Joseph McCormick was a cadet at Virginia Military Institute.

Obviously, these two individuals started out on very different paths coming from very different places.  And yet now, in these truly evolutionary times, their paths have united.  Despite vastly different backgrounds and experiences, they have come to similar conclusions, and find themselves on the same mission:  To reunite America around the virtues and values we have in common, because it appears to be the only way to coalesce the whole-brained, whole-hearted intelligence required to transform the current spiritual, political, ecological and economic crises into an evolutionary opportunity.

If you take a look at the current political landscape and see angry folks on either side of a barricade, it’s easy to feel discouraged.  However, when you also consider the “fierce conversations” Joseph has been leading in small communities and large cities, there is a genuine cause for optimism.  Individuals from both left of center and right of center – primarily conservative libertarians and progressive greens – have been gradually developing a new narrative that can lift the body politic out of the box of our current dysfunction.  By examining assumptions, comparing notes, sharing information and learning together, these two factions are calling forth a new political order that serves both the individual and the community, and honors ecology and economy.

By sitting in “council,” by airing all opinions and exhausting all positions, these groups have come to an obvious truth:  No political savior will be coming down from the heavens to make everything right.  We are left with the wisdom and resources of “we the people.”  We have met the savior, and he / she is us.  Moreover, the solutions don’t lie in the positions we find ourselves in but rather in a process that uses the energy of strongly held values inside a sacred circle to create emergent solutions that everyone in the group “owns” as opposed to unsatisfying compromise where each side loses something.

The American Evolution

In coming together from such different experiences and worldviews, Joseph and Steve have a remarkably similar take on America’s past, our present and our future.  While neither of them buy into the “American exceptionalism” that keeps us blind to our own shadow, they both deeply appreciate the practical spirituality behind the founding of this country.  What other country in the world was created on the notion of inalienable rights to life, liberty and happiness – where the formulators weren’t just blowing gas, but meant it?  And where else – particularly 235 years ago – did a band of extraordinary ordinary citizens stand up to the largest multinational corporation in the world, the British East India Company, and defeat the British army and navy?  Finally, and most importantly, what nation prior to then proclaimed that the citizen had the same sovereign rights as the king?

Joseph and Steve also share a similar view of the present.  The bipolar insanity – encouraged and cultivated by those who benefit from a divided body politic – has weakened us locally and globally.  Instead of focusing on finding outside the box solutions together, we tend to gather in the safe harbor of being right – or left.  While we might find comfort in positions and stands, there is no movement possible if everyone stays in their position.  There are those who appreciate the “stalemate” as the ultimate balance of power, making sure things don’t teeter this way or totter that.  However, if the problem is the proverbial house on fire, inactivity is not an option.

In regard to the future, Joseph and Steve have once again reached a similar conclusion.  We must integrate the most functional elements of progressivism (growth) and conservatism (protection) into a whole-brained, full spectrum politics where citizens from all across the political landscape come together to address the questions, “How do we wish to progress?” and “What do we choose to conserve?”

Is this possible?

Well, as Joseph has more than demonstrated in his transpartisan groups and meet-ups, when ordinary citizens are temporarily liberated from media “babblum,” and are held in a sacred circle of mutual respect, extraordinary clarity and wisdom emerges.

However, to access this wisdom requires … (ready, all you Creationists?) … evolution!  We must evolve from children of God to adults of God (or, for the non-religious, adults of Good) and stop acting like “tenants” of America and begin to act like “owners.”  This means facing the uncomfortable truths behind the real don’t ask, don’t tell policy (we promise not to ask the government what it is doing to “protect” us, and they promise not to tell us), and disabusing ourselves of the wishful thinking that our rulers will rule wisely without our involvement.  As Lord Acton said, “Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

And here is another fundamental principle Joseph and Steve agree on.  Just as there is no top down political savior, transformation involves a “critical mass of the heretofore uncritical masses” waking up to the realization that there can be no integrity at the top without integrity at the bottom.  The political evolution we seek is first a spiritual and psychological evolution, as we reconnect with our own internal Source and acknowledge and face our own individual and collective shadow with courage and compassion.

The Possible Dream

Those who mistook hopium for hope last time around may be understandably defended against being fooled again.  So let us affirm that we WILL be fooled again by the two major party candidates.  We can plan on it, in fact.  When push comes to shove in 2012, we will be leveraged to hunker down with whichever cultural tribe we feel most affinity for, and once again Lucy will pull the proverbial football away and we the people (Charlie Brown) will fall on our collective ass.

We will once again fall prey to political lies unless …

Unless we expose the current political game and refuse to play it, AND gather around a higher, deeper and more enduring truth.  The one unifying issue that both progressives and Tea Partiers agree on is, the rule of gold has overruled the Golden Rule.  In order to establish this “One Suggestion” as the true heart and soul of who we are, we have to recognize, acknowledge and celebrate the coherent field of love that “undertruths” both the religious expressions of God and the non-religious expressions of Good.

As the Swami would say, “the upwising is gathering esteem,” and the chutzpah of those in power has become so obvious to so many that a mass awakening seems to be occurring.  While there are those who would like to misdirect this anger against the wrong targets, there are enough people awakening on both sides to actually change the game this time around.  Thanks to information and activism, both on the internet and the outernet, we now have the power to gather ordinary people together to access extraordinary wisdom – and coalesce a heartful, soulful moral authority that will be so universally obvious that it will effectively encircle the mechanism of government.  When 80 percent of the people favor a principle or policy – and everyone knows it – that will effectively check the power of lobbyists lobbying against it.

Here’s the Wind Up … And the Pitch

On behalf of Steve and Joseph, I am inviting those subscribers who are motivated and able to join me in supporting a project they are dedicating themselves to for the next 18 months – completing their book, Reuniting America:  A Manifesto For Changing the Political Game, AND empowering transpartisan conversations, actions and policies that will make the 2012 election our first “real” election in generations.  The book will significantly expand upon the e-book version, using Joseph’s story and his own to “pace” both conservative and progressive sensibilities, while evoking the best of both impulses.  They will address the important issues of why we need to reunite America, and around what?  Finally, they will offer the principles and practices that are most likely to yield breakthough results inside these sacred circles.

Their intention is to have the book ready for publication by Labor Day, and self-publish at first for two reasons:  First, they want to have the book out, gathering momentum this fall as a lead up to next year’s electoral season.  Secondly, an already-successful book is a much easier sell to major publishers.  And, it’s far more compelling to have a book you can hold in your hand than a PDF you can download.

There are a number of forces in play right now that could very well launch the transpartisan movement through national media, and have it be part of the conversation whether the media likes it or not.  As Scoop Nisker used to say, “If you don’t like the news, make some of your own.”

Meanwhile, the budget for four months of writing and research plus the wherewithal to design, print and distribute books is $50,000.  Normally, a publisher would pay an advance like that (or at least they would in the old days) but they don’t have the time to wait.  Fortunately, they have a nonprofit 501 (c) 3 fiscal sponsor who has set up a fund to support Reuniting America as a nonpartisan endeavor to educate and inspire the body politic.  They are set up to take tax-deductible donations of $250 or more, and we invite you to make a donation and become a sponsor.  Here are the Sponsor Categories:

Profounder Founder: $5,000

Profound Founder: $2,500

Founder: $1,000

Founding Sponsor: $500

Sponsor: $250

All of the above will be honored on our Founders Page (unless you wish to remain anonymous) as will those who make lesser donations! To make a tax deductible donation of $250 or more, please make check payable to their 501c3 sponsor: Global Citizen Journey, 4425 Baker Ave. NW, Seattle, WA  98107  (Memo: Transpartisan Upwising)

For those who wish to make a donation of any other amount, please visit PayPal (http://paypal.com) and use sinfo@transpartisan.us to end your contribution.

And, of course, you can get a jump start on the whole idea by downloading their e-book here. (http://reunitingamerica.org)

Four-Month Budget

Steve Bhaerman, Writer’s Advance: $4,000 / mo x 4 months =  $16,000

Joseph McCormick, Writer’s Advance: $4,000 / mo x 4 months =  $16,000

Authors’ Travel, Research expenses: $2,000 / mo x 4 months =  $8,000

Book Design, Publishing Expenses: $5,000

Printing, 1000 copies: $5,000

__________________________

Total Production Expenses: $50,000

Finally, in the midst of all the bad news, here is some good news:  There will be good news … IF we make it.

Steve and Joseph send a wave of deep gratitude to their Evolutionary Co-Hearts.

 

 

 

Brad Blanton is the best-selling author of Radical Honesty and Radical Parenting a psychotherapist, seminar leader and Founder of the Center for Radical Honesty, His new Korporate Kannibal Kookbook‘s sub-title tells it like it is, “The Empire is Consuming us: either we eat them or they eat us.” And the other subtitle: “Recipes for Ending Civilization and Avoiding Collective Suicide.” This is the most thought provoking book and interview I’ve come across in a long time.

Rather than reviewing his book, I’m going to share a great video interview with Brad and my cousin Alan Hutner, the host of Transitions Radio, a three hour live Sunday radio show and web cast from Santa Fe. Alan has developed an extensive library of interviews with some of the leading visionaries of the past 25 years. An excellent lighthouse of wisdom. Enjoy.

To watch the remaining six segments of Alan’s interview with Brad, click here.

Reuniting America: A Toolkit for Changing the Political Game is a paradigm-busting new book by historian Steve Bhaerman aka Swami Beyondananda who says, “We need a transpartisan upwising to overgrow the partisan trance.”

There is the classic story about a man who is down on his knees in a parking lot one night, obviously looking for something. A passerby asks him what he’s doing.

“I’m looking for my car keys,” is the reply.

“Oh, let me help,” the stranger offers. “Where do you think you lost them?”

“I lost them in the bushes over there,” the man replies, pointing.

“Then why are you looking in the parking lot?” the stranger asks, puzzled.

“Well, because there’s more light here.”

That story is the story of well-meaning political activism in America. Those who want to create a healthier world for our children tend to invest time, resources and hopes in organizations and campaigns working in the familiar well lit spaces. However, as we are finding out, most if not all of the political and economic decisions that impact our lives and world are made in the endarkened corridors of power.

Go ahead, pick an issue:

* Health care “reform” completely bypassed a single-payer system, and instead coerces Americans to buy insurance from a private monopoly.

* In spite of hope and hype, the foreign policy of the new boss is not that different from the old one. (Can you say, “Egypt?”)

* Again, despite a “regime change,” Monsanto rules the Agriculture Department, the banksters regulate the banks, the drug companies run health care, and big media owns the FCC.

Meanwhile, our elections cost seventeen times what they did 35 years ago, and with each election we the people seem to be less and less in charge of what really happens. The “free press” that our Founding Fathers hoped would inform the electorate has devolved into a brainwashing machine stuck on spin lobbing weapons of mass-distraction from behind the Irony Curtain.

Despite the fact that the vast majority of Americans from all across the political spectrum mistrust the corporate state, we have been divided into two warring tribes, and while the red and blue tribes have been arguing about whether it’s worse to kill the born or the unborn, our commonwealth has been stolen out from under us.

No wonder the topic of politics – hearing the word, actually – for most people, including your editor, elicits feelings of disgust, anger, hopelessness, apathy, and even dread for our future. In spite of it all, dedicated activists seeking a better world continue crawling around the parking lot playing the only game in town. Until now…

If we want to have genuine change instead of chump change, if we want a political system that serves the commonwealth and not just the uncommonly wealthy, we must change the political game.

How? Read on.

A Recipe for Political Climate Change

As you may or may not know, Steve Behrman’s background is in political science and history. And, after more than four decades of political activism and awareness, I believe we now have a political game-changer thanks to his friend and colleague Joseph McCormick. Steve first met Joseph nearly three years ago, and they instantly had a meeting of the minds and hearts. Although their backgrounds couldn’t be more different – Joseph is a former Army Ranger and Christian Coalition activist, and Steve is a one-time Vietnam War protester and lifelong progressive – their “foreground” is remarkably the same.

They both resonate with the Declaration of Independence’s radical contention that our rights to life, liberty, and happiness derive not from an external sovereign, but from our intrinsic sovereignty as human beings.

And they both recognize that only by integrating the opposites that seem to divide us – left and right, progressive and conservative, feminine and masculine, heart and mind, and even science and religion – can we successfully rule ourselves in this challenging time, and bring the vision of America’s Founders of a nation built on freedom, justice, truth, and unity into this new century.

After a ten-month collaboration, they are publishing – now in e-book form and soon in print format – a book that can transform politics in America, and profoundly impact the world we live in. The book is largely Joseph’s story of political transformation from political divider to political unifier. Just as valuable as his inspiring personal story are the lessons he has learned along the way, the practices and principles that will turn “We, the People” into a force powerful enough to “overgrow” the current system based on the unchecked, unbalanced, unmitigated rule of money.

From Joseph’s personal story, you will learn:

* How Congressional campaigns are really run, and what candidates have to do to “qualify” for special interest money.

* How losing everything led to a spiritual and political epiphany.

* A journey to “look for America” where interviews with Americans as politically diverse as Ralph Nader and Ross Perot, Grover Norquist and Noam Chomsky revealed striking similarities in regard to what’s wrong with America and how to set it right.

* A remarkable Reuniting America retreat that brought Al Gore face-to-face with the leading Republican debunker of climate change – and might have been the reason Pat Robertson told his flock, “Climate change is real.”

* The issue that united the Christian Coalition and MoveOn.org, and jammed the switchboard of Congress.

* How an Oregon town transformed local governance, by not lobbying.

* How a politically-diverse group of Seattle citizens meeting for eight months offer a glimpse of what nearly all Americans want, and are willing to work for.

From Part II of the book, Lessons Learned, you will discover:

* Why it’s important to bring all parties and viewpoints into the room.

* How to use political polarities as a dynamo to propel a group past positions toward practical solutions.

* How to manage emotional triggers so that both conservatives and liberals feel safe.

* Why and how a new political alignment is emerging between “conservatarians” (conservative libertarians) and “progreensives” (progressive greens) and how this can transform politics from the grassroots up.

* The practices and principles that will create a “sacred container” for a democratic republic.

* What “Sunshine Governance” of We, the People could look like – and how amazingly close we are to having it.

You like me, may be so turned off by politics that you don’t believe anything could turn you on. Maybe you’ve sworn off “hopium,” or find the challenges too overwhelming or have decided to focus on the personal, your own life and family. Maybe you have taken a peek down the political rabbit hole and just “don’t want to go there.” The undeniable truth is, “there” has already come here. We are already subject to “subtle dictatorship” thanks to government secrecy, the so-called Patriot Act and myriads of directives seeking to consolidate power at the top. These conditions will impact our lives and the lives of children whether we like it or not. Denial – or as the Swami calls it, “not-seeism” – will only make the current conditions worse.

Two principles of political science are operative regardless of what we do or don’t do:

1. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
2. When few rule, few benefit.

Reuniting America
If you’ve read and were inspired by Spontaneous Evolution, Steve and Bruce Lipton’s eye opening examination of science and history, prepare yourself to be inspired by a practical blueprint for political evolution that will take us past both hope and hopelessness to genuine empowerment as healthy cells of a healed body politic.

Let the new political game begin, and let’s get ready to take the field.

Order or learn more about this book here now for just $9.97. It may be the most important $9.97 you have every spent on politics or anything else. It’s a tiny investment in a paradigm shifting political blueprint that you can activate immediately. Once you have read their transpartisan manifesto, Steve and Joseph invite your comments on their website, reunitingamerica.org