Gandhiji, Guitars and Corporate Ethics w/pic

Screen shot from "Gandhi"


Mahatma Gandhi only wore suits in the earliest part of his life and one of the greatest and bravest men of the 20th Century, maybe in thousands of years, from then onward only wore clothes from cotton he had spun himself.  This was the home-spun he mentioned often as the best way to find freedom because it killed the market for linens made in English factories.  The English factory workers supported him because they knew his work and they loved him too.

I'm not sure if that's Katurba (his wife) behind him or Mirabehn (an English or American 'co-conspirator').  The role of Mirabehn in Gandhi's life is really not clear although it is quite beautiful in the movie.

Mohandas Gandhi was his given name but Mahatma means 'blessed one' or something similar so calling him Mahatma Gandhi was a sign of deep love and respect.


As to 'blessed one,' on the night his father died, Gandhi was staying with him but he excused himself for a while to go off to make some monkey love with Katurba, his wife.  While he was gone, his father died, and he never forgave himself.  At same point he gave up sex and he held to that for the rest of his life in part in atonement for what he felt was abandoning his father at the point of death, particularly that it was for lustful reasons.


There's a statue of Gandhi in front of a church in Serbia and the inscription reads 'Non-Violence is the essence of all religion.'


As we see from many religions in the world just now, that isn't true.  There is a fundamental question of ethics and morality in the world at the moment and some do not have a valid answer because they have lost the way, specifically with regard to any requirement for ethics in business dealings.  The GOP position, possibly deliberately inflammatory, is there is no mandate on a business to do anything except make money and ethics / morality are not a consideration in that.  There is no exaggeration in that statement as the hardline GOP believes it.

The same general logic is used for the defense of America as any mechanism is valid so long as America does not die as a result of it.  The rationale for assassinating Salvador Allende comes from that.  The same applies with the assassination of Che Guevara and so on in an excruciating parade of self-righteous murders committed by the CIA and other US dark agencies.


There is no need to flog the fact of America losing its way as you can see the confusion all over the place.  There is rampaging righteousness regarding abortion but the same people are indifferent in their pro-life positions regarding the killing of hundreds of thousands of people or millions if it suits that satanic purpose in some other country.  One of those positions may be right but sure as hell not both of them at the same time in the same person, an ostensibly religious person.

For example, if someone opposes abortion and also opposes war then I may not necessarily agree with the position but at least it's consistent and makes sense.  When a GOP candidate talks of closing Planned Parenthood and then glassing the Middle East to finish the 'problem,' there's no option but to leave the room because the position is so obviously inconsistent, quite apart from the blazing amorality of it.


Yesterday I got a less-than-amusing reminder on how much they have lost their way as some shavetail was trying to school me on the rightness of the Iraq slaughter.  I suggested to him perhaps he should read of the Gulf of Tonkin before he lectures about moral rightness of America's little pseudo-wars or of any idea of truth out of Washington.

He said he did not know what I was talking about.

I said thanks but I already knew that.

Note:  he was trivial and his only purpose was to shift the blame for Iraq from Bush to Obama.  They aren't very clever these people so I walked away.


There's nothing you can do but walk away from people who are so blind in their pseudo-patriotism they have excluded anything from America's history which confounds their view of it.  Doc is one example of that and it's impossible to talk to him because he's so rabid about it.  Lotho was a bit whacked until he realized I wasn't firing personal shots at him but the GOP in him does not murder his thinking and his logic; the thinking is quite different.

Lotho, that's not a cheap shot as I've tried multiple times of late but he doesn't want any part of it.  He's had that chip on his shoulder since he was a kid and it's only got heavier.  I don't think he knows how to get it off and that's a shame but it's his move to make and there are definitely openings.  Maybe it happens sometime, unknown.


No-one would be more pleased than I if Doc were to ask, hey, what's up with electric guitars, I've got a few, you know.

Yah, I know.  Let's talk about those.  What do you do with them??

I play them, he says.

So I sez, yah, but what do you play?  Do you like to play those bluez, do you like to do a Nugent rampage (i.e. from before he turned into a talking houseplant), or maybe you fingerpick that classical.  I don't know and sure I'm curious.

I know he likes that Joe Bonamassa but I find his play a bit sterile and I want more color in the jams.  For my take, it's not about playing blues but about being blues.  I want to hear that in the color of the notes.

I may not be the best but I'm damn sure colorful (larfs).  I don't need to be the best and maybe that's what dogs the Doc since he's highly-competitive and he does need it.  Unknown.

There's kind of a wistful 'things should not be so complicated' but everyone knows how that goes from their own families ... although possibly not for only children whom I suspect are a significant part of the rise of a mixed-up conservatism insofar as they were never really taught anything about sharing.  Vegetating soccer moms spoiled the living hell out of them and they grew up thinking that's how it is supposed to be.  That spoiling absolutely did not happen with Doc or any of the other sibs (larfs).

(Ed:  too Doctor Spock)

Good point, matey.  Well, I mean no harm by it.  Maybe we talk about axe whackin' sometime ... or maybe we don't.  It would be better if we did but maybe it can't happen.

That the GOP can get in the middle of axe whackin' is one pitiful bitch in my estimation!  (larfs)


Kannafoot is way lost on this too and I know, just as with Lotho, his religious faith is pure and in his heart.  There's no equivocation, both of these guys have reviewed the matter meticulously and decided this is right.  Conversely, there's the online religious crowd which is way out in the bullrushes somewhere and they post signs like GOD LOVES ME, I LOVE GOD, or SEND PRAYERS ... I'm sure you know the type as they're all over the place with beatific smiles and eyes so blank they appear sedated.

Maybe we can call the latter variety Beaty Boppers and they're irrelevant to this.  Probably they would have been more settled in their beliefs if they had found competent preachers but they split off as evangelicals and walked away from preachers (unless they're political) because, as with the anti-vaxx crowd, they know better.


Kannafoot is clear, as many are not, the Bible is the basis for law but is not the law by itself.

Understand the disclaimer fully up-front as I love this guy.  I've known him for a long time.  He's honest, passionate, smart, and he uses his mind rather than treating it like an enemy and pushing opposing thoughts away.  He may reject any opposing thoughts but he will listen and the rejection will have a logical basis even if others may not accept the logic.  That's fine as adults call this conversation (larfs).  Congress has no idea how to do it.

(Ed:  was that last sentence supposed to be a revelation?)

Another good point, matey.


Kannafoot is in full support of the corporation having no moral mandate to do anything.  It's motivator is money and that's the only one it is supposed to have.

I know his faith is real and pure and my core processor bounces off the metallic walls of my skull trying to reconcile how that can work with his philosophical position.  The Bible is not law and it mustn't be but ... that's where I choke.  It seems the Bible is over here and the behavior of the U.S. is over there and they have little to do with each other.  I don't mean to be judgmental as the situation is mystifying.

Jesus stands there and then crosses his arms over his chest.  He is silent for little while and, still holding his arms crossed, he says, "Really, man?  Really?"


(Ed:  are you going for the full megalomanic divinity prize?)

Nah, I hope that wasn't perceived as blasphemous as I could easily imagine Jesus looking at the world today and doing exactly that.

Really, man?  Really?


Besides, I really don't see why one needs to be a Christian to believe Jesus walked the Earth.  Seems to me there's no point in denying it except to create pointless controversy.  Whether he and Gandhi were the same type of man or different is all a matter of faith but I'm not going to argue either way as I have the same reverence for both of them.  In some eyes, that's blasphemy but in mine it is respect.