THE RESURRECTION MYTH / JESUS WAS DIVINELY HUMAN AND A REBEL FOR LOVE

This arresting picture of Jesus as a revolutionary, imitating the style of the famous poster of 1960s fighter Che Guevara, was produced as an advertising poster encouraging people to go to church during Easter 1999

Jesus was divinely human ~ a determined revolutionary and an evolutionary forerunner for a state of love and soul consciousness which is also deepest within each one of us. Only the church as an institution stands in the way of this common innate connection and empowering knowledge : Allen L Roland

This Easter, as the 10 Billion dollar Large Haldron Collider ( LHC ) in Geneva, Switzerland smashes protons together, at unheard of speeds, in search for the elusive 'God Particle' ~ let me reveal that the answer has already been found and it's not a particle ~ It's LOVE.

And JESUS was a manifestation of that love ~ a determined revolutionary and an evolutionary forerunner for a state of love and soul consciousness which is also deepest within each one of us. A state of consciousness that exists beyond time and space and is one in the same with the experience of an after death and near death experience.

As such, Jesus was experienced after he died by those closest to him because that deep unconditional love and state of soul consciousness existed also within his closest followers.

This is not unusual now but it certainly was 2000 years ago.

Gallup has revealed that nearly half of all Americans believe that they have been in contact with someone who has died ~ usually a dead spouse or sibling who they had a deep loving connection with . Another important point in Gallup's study was that the major factor associated with contacting the dead was a belief in a loving God, rather than a judgmental one.

In that sense, Jesus represents the transition from an externalized old testament God of wrath and judgment to an internalized new testament god of love and altruism.

My own mother appeared to me the night she suddenly and unexpectantly died in 1987 ~ some 3000 miles away ~ and not only did she tell me how deeply she loved me but she also said that she knew what I knew ~ Allen, I Know, Allen, I Know ..

I had sent her a copy of my Unified Field Theory some weeks prior to her death which can best be summed up in this one statement ~ The basic underlying and uniting force of the Universe is a psychic energy field of love and soul consciousness ( The Unified Field ) which lies not only beyond time and space but ALSO beneath our deepest fears and whose principle property is the universal urge to unite.

So my mother appeared to me, much like Jesus did with his followers, and told me that she was now in that same state of unconditional love and soul consciousness which I call The Unified Field, thus ~ Allen, I Know, Allen, I Know ..

Did Jesus not do the very same thing when he appeared to his followers after his death ~ proving to them that the kingdom of heaven was within them.

Good Friday is the day Christians remember the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, who 78% of all Americans believe to be the son of God who came to Earth to die for our sins.

In a Newsweek poll ( Is GOD Real / April 2007 ) ~ 78% of Americans believe Jesus rose from the dead but eighty-five percent (85%) also think that the person known to history as Jesus actually walked the earth 2,000 years ago ( Rasmussen Poll )

81% of Americans say they are Christians which is now the world's largest faith ~ with 2 billion believers or roughly 33% of the earth's population. Newsweek reveals that 75% of them say that Jesus was sent to earth to absolve mankind of its sins .

Let's get something straight. Jesus was not sent from anywhere for Jesus was divinely human ~ no different than you or myself at birth ~ and the humanizing of Jesus is an essential step in the journey towards taking responsibility for that same love deepest within each one of us.

As such, the natural birth and loving relationship of Jesus and Mary Magdalene completely humanizes Jesus, takes him off the unreachable pedestal the Catholic Church and others have put him on ~ and makes him finally accessible to the world through love and Relationship.

As such it also places women , ( the divine feminine ) as symbolized by Mary Magdalene, in their rightful place at the right of Jesus ~ and certainly on more than equal footing with men.

Teilhard said it beautifully ~ The only right love is that between couples whose passion leads them both, one through the other, to a higher possession of their being ..... Union, the true upward union in the spirit, ends by establishing the elements it dominates in their own perfection.

We all have a personal covenant with Jesus in our capacity to unconditionally love one another as he manifested that love in his life. It is my potential to love as Jesus loved that fills me with faith.

My faith is not blindly based on a literal belief in the church, bible, the virgin birth and the resurrection stories.

However, with the acceptance of a Unified Field of love and soul consciousness, which exists beyond time and space ~ the bible, virgin birth and the resurrection stories assume symbolic, not literal significance.

For example, could not the resurrection stories be symbolic of the fact that the love of Jesus can never die and is deepest within each one of us?

This is why we have never forgotten him ~ much like I have never forgotten my grandfather who also unconditionally loved me.

Could not the virgin birth be symbolic of the fact that each one of us came from and are born in a state of love and soul consciousness ~ regardless if we were wanted or not.

There is no such thing as an ugly soul ~ but there are many maimed and wounded ones. I witness resurrections every day as a heart centered psychotherapist and particularly with veterans with PTSD ~ as they emerge from their self imposed cocoons of fear and self loathing and reclaim their original love, joy, purpose and authentic self. http://allenlrolandsweblog.blogspot.com/2011/03/veterans-respond-positively-to-heart.html

The controversial Catholic theologian Hans Kung in his thought provoking book On Being A Christian has helped to demythologize the bible by attempting to rediscover the true Jesus:

" Against all tendencies to deify Jesus, it must constantly be stressed today that he was wholly and entirely man with all the consequences of this ( capacity for suffering, fear, loneliness, insecurity, temptations, doubts, possibility for err ) Not merely man but true man. "

Jesus was a rebel for love, a definitive threat to the establishment and they, in essence, killed the messenger ~ just like we did with Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.

For those of you who are waiting for Christ's return, I will tell you to look within, for it is there that he resides in our deepest propensity to unite with and love one another.

But if a man says, " I Love God ", while hating his brother , he is a liar. If he does not love the brother whom he has seen, it cannot be that he loves God whom he has not seen .

I John 4: 19-20

Thus, in our current search and groping for our roots and beginnings ~ we will eventually rescue Jesus from the church, and the unreachable pedestal they have put him on, and discover Jesus ( The Man ) and finally realize that The Christ is the love that is deepest within each one of us.

HAPPY EASTER

Allen L Roland

http://allenlrolandsweblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/resurrection-myth-jesus-was-divinely.html

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

Freelance Alternative Press Online columnist and psychotherapist Allen L Roland is also available for comments, interviews, speaking engagements and private consultations ( allen@allenroland.com )

THE SEVEN STAGES OF RELATIONSHIP / FEW GET BEYOND STAGE SIX

Relationship is a means to an end versus an end in itself. The true purpose of relationship is the full flowering of each partner but only those who conquer fear reach the seventh stage of relationship : Allen L Roland

Most people are afraid of love because they are afraid of their deepest joy, delight and inner freedom and are trapped by a fear of deep vulnerability and intimacy.

In relationship, we must reach a place where being honest and being true to yourself is more important than the survival of the relationship! Let me illustrate this using Stendhal's and Roland's seven stages of a love relationship :

1. ADMIRATION " I really admire you as a person "

2. BEGINNING OF DESIRE “I think I'd like to get to know you better."

3. HOPE " I hope you feel the same way about me "

4. INCEPTION OF LOVE " I think I'm falling in love with you "

5. FIRST CRYSTALLIZATION " I see the beauty and perfection within you "

6. DOUBT, FEAR AND/OR JEALOUSY, ANGER AND RESENTMENT " You're going to hurt me or betray me like others have "

This is where Stendhal ended his six stages of love for it is the stage where most, if not all, emotional relationships end with mutual anger, resentment or fear submerging all traces of the original love. What we do not realize in this stage is that these feelings are often associated with earlier childhood or relationship hurts we felt with loved ones and we are face to face with the decisions we made at that time to repress and deny our deepest feelings ~ because there was seemingly no-one there for us. We can either run, as most people do, or go inside and go through these fears by not denying the love, taking accountability for these feelings and stop being a victim! You cannot escape stage six until you are willing to go inside, take total accountability for your actions and feelings and stop denying love. This takes great courage but the payoff is immense! Resentment doesn't heal! Anger doesn't heal! Only love truly heals!

7. ROLAND'S SECOND CRYSTALLIZATION " I feel the beauty and perfection within myself and I'm sharing it with you and the world "

This Stage cannot be accomplished unless we realize our ultimate quest in life is to fully experience our authentic self and our connection to our original state of soul consciousness and an innate connection with the world.

IT’S A PLACE OF INNER VERSUS OUTER VALIDATION !

"Until I let go I cannot grow ", "Great love can both take hold and let go." When you let go in relationship, you do not let go of the love. To let go with love you must, in essence, consciously love your partner. Your self respect will be your guide. You must reach the place where you can say that it’s more important that I love myself than you loving me. Conscious love (non-possessive, non-dependent and unconditional love) is rarely obtained between humans. The conscious love motive, in its most developed state, is the wish that the object should arrive at its own innate perfection ~ regardless of the consequences to the lover or partner. It is total unconditional love and when we come from this place we are embracing our deepest spiritual essence and a state of soul consciousness within ourselves. The paradox of this attitude is that such love always invokes eventually a similar attitude in its objects because we all seek, at the deepest level, to be unconditionally loved. As such, when we allow love to be our guiding intention through our thoughts and feelings and learn to trust unconditional love ~ we begin to see through clearer eyes and all things come into perfect balance and harmony,

Jesus consciously or unconditionally loved and the reason we have never forgotten him is because that same capacity to consciously love and be loved lies deepest within each one of us ~ but many of us have looked outside and externalized it versus gone inside and internalized it as I do with my clients as a heart centered psychotherapist.

The path to the soul is always through doors of fear and most of those fears appear in relationship. You don't realize those fears are illusions until you stop denying love and go through them. Only then can you truly claim the greatest gift ~ yourself.

Only then can you become a fragment of life's heart and transcend time and space in the process ~ for the hearts' desire is to love so deeply that we become one with a Unified Field of love and soul consciousness as well as claim our part in an evolving loving plan and always from a place of inner celebration and delight.

Allen L Roland

http://allenlrolandsweblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/seven-stages-of-relationship-few-get.html

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

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

FUKUSHIMA / ONE OF THE GREATEST DISASTERS IN MODERN TIME

The silent monstrous killer of deadly radiation has been released at Fukushima and despite the denial of the Japanese government ~ its repercussions will be rapidly rising death rates. The lessons of Chernobyl 25 years ago offers Japan a deadly hint of what’s to come for clearly we are witnessing one of the greatest disasters in modern times: Allen L Roland

The mainstream media has all but buried the BP Deepwater Horizon drilling rig disaster off the coast of Louisiana on April 20, 2010 and the subsequent 210 million gallon oil gusher while Gulf coast residents continue to say “The oil is not gone. Dead wildlife are washing up on our shores by the hundreds, Entire livelihoods are in peril” in one of the world’s greatest ecological disasters.

Now the mainstream media is attempting to bury one of the greatest disasters in modern time in Fukushima where residents will soon be crying out that ” the radiation is not gone, people are dying and our livelihoods are in peril ” but this time other voices are being heard.

One of the most reliable voices speaking out on the Fukushima nuclear disaster is Arnie Gundersen who was an engineer and senior vice president with Danbury, Connecticut-based Nuclear Energy Services. He was as insider in commercial nuclear power generation, and understands reactor operation as well as any in his field.

Last week, when the Japanese government finally announced that the disaster rating at Fukushima went from 5 to 7 ~ the worst possible nuclear accident was finally acknowledged publicly. What went unacknowledged, according to Gundersen, was that in an instant the catastrophe became 100 times worse than had been previously reported. Each increase in numeric value officially acknowledges a ten-fold increase in level of nuclear disaster. In other words, from 5 to 7 was 10 x 10: or 100 times greater.

Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now!, interviewed Michio Kaku on her show last week and asked him the very same question about the raising of the category 5 to a 7 in par with Chernobyl. Dr. Michio Kaku ,professor of theoretical physics at the City University of New York and the City College of New York, confirmed that Tokyo Electric has been in denial trying to downplay the full impact of this nuclear accident ~ “However, there's a mathematical formula by which you can determine what level this accident is. This accident has already released something in the order of 50,000 trillion becquerels of radiation. You do the math. That puts it right in the middle of a level 7 nuclear accident. Still less than Chernobyl; however, radiation is continuing to leak out of the reactors. The situation is not stable at all … So, you're looking at a ticking time bomb. It appears stable but the slightest disturbance from a secondary earthquake, a pipe break, an evacuation of the crew at Fukushima can set off a full scale nuclear meltdown at three nuclear power plants far beyond what we saw at Chernobyl.”

Kaku is not a guy to be sneezed at. He's a Japanese American physicist, a best-selling author, a professor of theoretical physics at the University of New York, and the author of A Physics of the Future. This is a well-known expert in this field. He's telling the truth, and the truth is this: the Japanese government is in denial and Fukushima is a ticking time bomb.

What remains unacknowledged is that Fukushima is continuing to release terabecquerels of radioactive poison and will continue to do so for months, if not years but the public is not fully getting this message.

Gunderson's video presentation is an absolute must-watch. In the 7 and 3/4 minute video here, he exposes a great deal, including previously confidential NRC and nuclear industry inside information. It's clear, according to Gundersen, that March 21st, ten days after the earthquake and tsunami, the Fukushima disaster was already rated a 7 and that the NRC, the Nuclear Industry, and TEPCO were already limiting the flow of Information and still are for that matter.

Today, we have reported evidence that the level of radioactivity in the seawater dramatically rose again. Iodine-131 spiked to 6,500 times the legal limit and levels of cesium-134 and cesium-137 rose nearly four fold.

It is here that we should address the lessons of Chernobyl ~ after 25 years, some of Chernobyl’s radioactive substances have either decayed or migrated deeper into the ground. Although levels of cesium-137 are slowly falling, concentrations of this damaging bioactive element remain high in many areas. Half of the cesium-137 deposited in 1986 will have decayed into relatively stable barium-137 by 2016 but a quarter of it will still remain in 2046 (60 years after the Chernobyl disaster)

Plants and animals continue to recycle cesium-137 through their tissue and consequently suffer from chronic radiation syndrome, increased mortality, reproductive losses and genetic defects.

The legacy of iodine-131 is although it decays relatively soon after the accident ~ enough of it inhaled or consumed in milk will cause a significant increase in thyroid cancer. A recent U.N. Report, drawing on studies by Western researchers, said 6,000 cases of thyroid cancer could be linked to Chernobyl but evidence regarding other diseases is inconclusive. Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusan researchers, however, say their studies show increased incidence of high blood pressure, stroke, vascular disease and non-malignant thyroid diseases among the after effects of Chernobyl.

I agree with Jim Kirwin who writes ~ “ Much has been made, by comparisons to Chernobyl; but that event involved just one reactor and the dimensions of its meltdown were only delayed one day before the Russian government ordered evacuations just 24 hours after the world heard about it. Japan chose the opposite course and has still not owned up to just how deadly the meltdown of their six reactors really is. The amount of radiation being released is staggering; but the massive attempt by business, by governments and by the entire nuclear industry to cover-this-up is a crime against humanity! The tonnage of the fuel rods that have melted and burned, so far, makes Chernobyl look like backyard fireworks, compared to what has already been released into the global environment which is already enough to kill the planet many times over. This is the unimaginable disaster that makes contrived-fiction look like children’s fairy-tales; because the lives of all of us depend directly on what the world does now to end this continuing nightmare.”

"Fish in nearby waters are now being measured at 4,000% above the Codex Alimentation limits for Iodine-131 and 447% of Cesium-137. Radioactive cesium has a half-life of 30 years. Radiation levels for the isotope are not considered “safe” for 10 to 20 times longer. The cesium released today will remain dangerous six centuries from now.... “Fukushima has become the dirty bomb of the Pacific"....("Radiation Spreads Worldwide", Freedom Against Censorship Thailand, Global Research, April 14, 2011)

Will Englund, Washington Post, offers on the LESSONS OF CHERNOBYL a hint of the fate that may well face Japan ~ “Near Pripyat, the abandoned and now overgrown dormitory city for Chernobyl, where moss grows on the central square and the wind thrums through the rusting Ferris wheel ~ lies a more haunting place. It was once the village of Kopachi, which happens to mean "Gravedigger" in Ukrainian. Every house there was buried in 1991 because of contamination. When Gravedigger was interred, only a nursery school was left standing, with a memorial to the Soviet soldiers and the fierce battles they fought here in World War II. "No one forgets. Nothing is forgotten," reads the plaque on the memorial. But because of Chernobyl there is now no one here to remember.” http://www.courierpress.com/news/2011/apr/10/chernobyl-may-teach-grim-lesson-to-japan/

Let us hope that the same fate will not befall Fukashima, Japan ~ which is already deserted and decaying.

Allen L Roland

http://allenlrolandsweblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/fukushima-one-of-greatest-disasters-in.html

About the author: Freelance Alternative Press Online columnist and psychotherapist Allen L Roland is available for comments, interviews, speaking engagements and private consultations ( allen@allenroland.com )

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

SALLY AND FRANK DISCUSS TAXES

Only a animated cartoon can do justice to the absurd reality of our current tax code where General Electric made 14 billion dollars profit and not only paid no taxes but got a 3 billion dollar refund: Allen L Roland

Click on this 3 minute video and enjoy. http://www.campaignmoney.org/blog/2011/04/14/new-video-how-avoid-paying-taxes

Happy tax day, if you’re not outraged, you’re either GE top management or on life support.

And here are 9 things the financial elite don’t want you to know about taxes.

http://www.wweek.com/portland/article-17350-9_things_the_rich_dont_want_you_to_know_about_taxes.html

This coming Monday, April 18 is Tax Day ~ and that's the day when "we the people" will demand our country back from these corporations in events all across the country.

Allen L Roland

http://allenlrolandsweblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/sally-and-frank-discuss-taxes.html

About the Author: Allen L Roland is a Freelance Alternative Press Online columnist and psychotherapist. Allen is also available for comments, interviews, speaking engagements and private consultations. Dr. Roland is a practicing psychotherapist, author and lecturer who also shares a daily political and social commentary on his weblog and website www.allenroland.com . He also guest hosts a monthly national radio show TRUTHTALK on www.conscioustalk.net

WAGGING THE DOG IN LIBYA

Libyan rebels or paid actors on a world stage where Crude oil has risen more than 30% since the conflict began.

Something makes me very suspicious about our involvement in Libya. Unlike the uprisings in Egypt ~ there is a pervading sense of a manufactured crisis or a wagging the dog operation with the media once again playing an active role in this deception as they did in Iraq: Allen L Roland

Let’s see now ….. let me get this straight ~

First we had a "no fly" zone.

That evolved into bombing missions.

However, the so-called “rebels”, knew that inflating their peril was their best hope for getting outside help. So, they blatantly concocted the specter of genocide ~ and Obama conveniently used it to justify a so called humanitarian intervention. Think Iraq war build up.

As Steve Chapman writes in Reason.com ~ “In 2002, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice waved off doubts about Saddam Hussein's nuclear ambitions, saying, "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud." Right now, the Benghazi bloodbath looks like Obama's mushroom cloud.” See story ~ http://reason.com/archives/2011/04/04/obamas-war-of-choice

But NATO's running it now, not the US, so no worries, right?

Now there's growing talk of putting US troops on the ground.

And last Saturday Robert Parry, Consortium News, reported ~ “ Neocon editors who increasingly dominate the New York Times want President Barack Obama to deploy A-10 and AC-130 aircraft for close-combat attacks against Libyan government forces in urban areas." http://www.readersupportednews.org/off-site-opinion-section/71-71/5566-nyt-demands-libyan-war-escalation

The drumbeats of war are growing and all seemingly in support of the noble and downtrodden Libyan "rebels” ~ which are quite often 3 or more guys, an AK and a pick up truck.

Robert Wenzel wrote in the Economic Policy Journal: " I have never before heard of a central bank being created in just a matter of weeks out of a popular uprising. This suggests we have a bit more than a rag tag bunch of rebels running around and that there are some pretty sophisticated influences."

In that regard, Libya not only has oil. According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), its central bank has nearly 144 tons of gold, in its vaults.

But what if there are no or very few Libyan rebels? What if this is a Wag the Dog Operation fueled by the global financial elite?

In 1997, the world at large was still relatively innocent about “political spin”. It is fair to say that the film “Wag the Dog”, made an important contribution in the general public’s understanding of political spin and how events can be manufactured by the media to change the political climate and even start a war ~ again, think Iraq war build up .

So now what about those so-called freedom loving Libyan rebels?

Hunch: My hunch says there aren't that many rebels, or very few, for that matter ~ and that this is a CIA special ops sponsored revolt with the ultimate aim being to maintain control of that Libyan sweet crude oil and fortify the political image of our Imperialistic war machine as well as our Nobel Peace Laureate president ( chuckle ).

This video clip, from Wag The Dog, depicts what it looks like when the media creates terrorists and atrocities and it’s not a wild stretch of the imagination that it’s happening right now in Libya.

Video: 4 minutes

http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/1074.html

Allen L Roland

http://allenlrolandsweblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/wagging-dog-in-libya.html

About the Author: Allen L Roland is a Freelance Alternative Press Online columnist and psychotherapist. Allen is also available for comments, interviews, speaking engagements and private consultations. Dr. Roland is a practicing psychotherapist, author and lecturer who also shares a daily political and social commentary on his weblog and website www.allenroland.com . He also guest hosts a monthly national radio show TRUTHTALK on www.conscioustalk.net

GOP's UNBALANCED BUDGET HAIRCUT

Click on Cartoon to enlarge

It’s grand Kabuki theater in Washington, DC these days with both parties politically posturing, our Appeaser in Chief President straddling the middle and everyone ignoring the two elephants in the room ~ tax cuts for the rich and out of control defense expenditures: Allen L Roland

In yet another last minute agreement ~ the Democrats and their appeaser in chief President Obama gave the Republicans more than they asked and averted a government shut down for a week. This most recent budget deal gives Republicans more in spending cuts than House Speaker John Boehner had asked for while funding for Planned Parenthood and women’s health issues were spared ~ but major questions remain in this Kabuki dance of political posturing.

The real question about our unending unbalanced budget is Can it go on forever and the answer is obviously NO ~ but both parties continue to kick this political can versus face the reality that the Government cannot continue to spend more than it makes indefinitely.

Fortunately there are some clear minds trying to answer this question as revealed on the Dylan Ratigan show where Dylan interviews Karl Denninger. Denninger was the original voice of the Tea Party before it morphed into its present confused state. Denninger confirms that this budget debacle can’t go on forever and that the Government covered up a normal 15% economic contraction in 2007 and 2008 with bailouts and is now facing the reality of a 30% contraction if something isn’t done relatively soon. Six minute Video ~ http://www.realecontv.com/videos/us/q-can-this-go-on-forever.html

Both Ratigan and Denninger agree that there are honest voices out there like Ron Paul, Tom Coburn and Bernie Sanders who could form a Coalition of the Willing to approach this problem in a non partisan manner. Here’s an excerpt from a recent Coburn editorial ~ “Congress and the White House are ignoring many blatant warning signs. Just last month Pimco, the world’s largest bond mutual fund, sold all its holdings of U.S. Treasury bills, the financial tools that allow us to pay Social Security benefits and fund our military. Bill Gross, who runs Pimco, sent a clear signal to investors that he expects rates on our Treasury bills to go up and prices to go down. Gross also expressed concern that the Federal Reserve, as part of its money-printing program, had bought 70 percent of all Treasury bills. When the government becomes the best customer of its own debt that’s called a Ponzi scheme, and it is only a matter of time before interest rates skyrocket. Any increase in interest rates when we are running massive deficits puts us in a deeper hole. In 2011, interest payments to service our debt are expected to reach $225 billion. If interest rates return to their historic average of 6 percent, interest payments will more than double, if not triple. Even if rates stay reasonably low, the interest-payment trap is dreadful. By 2022, tax revenue will cover only the cost of Medicare, Social Security and interest payments on the national debt. Everything else, including our defense budget, will be paid for with borrowed money, including money borrowed from potential adversaries adversaries. “ http://coburn.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/editorialsopinions

Both Ratigan and Denninger also agree that we must stop corporate handouts or welfare, address an unrealistic tax code and deal with out of control defense expenditures ~ where half of all defense spending goes to defend access to foreign oil.

Coburn correctly summarizes our economic plight in terms of the upcoming vote on the debt limit “ The best catalyst for forcing Congress to tackle our debt crisis will be the upcoming vote to raise the debt limit. We can either appease like Chamberlain or prepare like Churchill. Appeasement means avoiding the real issue and pandering to the debt-dodgers and dogmatists in both parties who define purity not on the basis of principle but partisanship and power. I’ve confronted the phony purists on my side and need partners on the left to confront the same on theirs. We will never address these challenges without putting everything on the table and making choices that may end careers. Of my Republicans friends I would ask: What good is a Republican Party without a republic? And of my Democrat friends: What good is your commitment to the poor without an economy to sustain your commitments?”

Representative Paul Ryan’s unbalanced budget haircut is a non-starter but it has indeed brought some important budget issues and questions to the table. My favorite question is how can we justify expanding and protecting Bush era tax cuts for the rich while protecting and expanding defense spending for two illegal and unnecessary wars and occupations?

It would be very helpful if our President was both asking and answering this same question ~ instead of gearing up for his re-election campaign.

Allen L Roland

http://allenlrolandsweblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/gops-unbalanced-budget-haircut.html

About the Author: Allen L Roland is a Freelance Alternative Press Online columnist and psychotherapist. Allen is also available for comments, interviews, speaking engagements and private consultations. Dr. Roland is a practicing psychotherapist, author and lecturer who also shares a daily political and social commentary on his weblog and website www.allenroland.com . He also guest hosts a monthly national radio show TRUTHTALK on www.conscioustalk.net