BREATHE EASY

Temptation is filled by an illusion of security that is slowly trekking through these remembering eyes. A single note of music enters the silence and blinds it. Lower the eyes reced into darkness before emerging into song. Thirsting for meditation overwhelms the senses. Cut up images of strange yet familiar travelers crowd the unfacing wall. Assuring words slip into the expanding process of thought as the mind avoids a slow step. Peace with the path called exsistance is welcomed and studied. The name Burma is constantly on my tongue and in my head. Interviewing a future occupation in a parallel mist of life, a knowing tune is heard through the doors separating two lights. Repeating that single note upon the silence triggers dejavu and the face becomes optamistic. ECHOES stir the postion of TIME and again peace is somehow felt. Relaxation consumes the soul and a cliche moment occurs instantly. Her smooth tan skin will soon be seen and the touch of her mouth onto my neck will come with those drops of Burgandy. Dripping into our waiting selves, the wine will release our statues of consciousness. Turning colors cloud the transparent skyline. A year of curiosity in lovers exile will be broken down in a reflection of Berlin and falling back into oneness and salvation cures the stain of regret. Breathe easy my lost comrades of the South. Breathe easy my lost travelers under the distant desert sun that consumes the Holy Land. Breathe easy my lost and closely remembered friends of that summer mountain. Breathe easy my lost mates of turmoil in that winter of Albright. Breathe easy my lost years of youth, which have been spent searching and learning.

MYSTIC JAZZ

Doped the drop and now the path is purple skyline all the way. There is a hunger of the mind for that feast of sound being presented as a gift from heights unknown. The dawn will soon ravage these misused eyes and bring salvation to the body, which constantly aches from reality exhaustion. Feet are painted brown by the monsoon dirt surrounding buildings with leaking roofs. A spanish memory of a dream life wandering in California has concealed itself within the womb of imagination. Each crack of the bone releases the truth concerned with allowing twenty more years of hard drifting.

There is an echo of Jaffa slowed to perfection and the belt tightens around the mind. Grim moments produce uncertainty that will only command those moments, for the hunter on the high tide has now reached the shore. The city sleeps and is unable to dream the dream of daylight reality during waking hours. Words written before can now display a conscience trip made towards the outer limits of a mind that has been dipped in a pool of silence. Internal pain withholds comfort and so the body resists. The rhythm of mystic jazz aids in defusing the pain, so that when the eyes rest they may rest with no sudden movements.

Travels made have been travels delayed to the fortunes of restricted Time. Situate the senses to appear ready to shatter themselves upon the lost route of explanation. Underground resistance has built an exit for the truth cerium in the form of a zombie pill. Conflict holds little sway here an now. Wait to engage that dim light on the shrouded mountain in order to indulge in the essence of being calm. Outstretched and broken. What a world to be born into. The skills required to create art are learned through observing a day in silence. Silence from strangers and voices of friends, along with a silence from the Earth, which will tempt this tongue to speak of beauty.

Spanish love grows without scorn from other beasts of the land. Distant shores of unexplained creations by the surface of this planet are calling to the mind, screaming for a path to follow. A dark noise attempts, but will not succeed in distracting that song of spanish love. The mind is steady as this student of the Earth delves into the complex cave of understanding thought. So much is unlearned and yet there still is a need to compare life to Dreams. Questions break with the rising sun that is feeding on the once ruling night of nights. Slip beneath and grip the teeth to voice one last yell at the mist protecting that secure dream, which has become free to divide and conquer the mind.

Evolution of American National Security: 19th Century to Cold War

Throughout the history of the United States, national security and the many strategies and policies that arise around that drive for security, has been a moving attachment to the very growth this nation has experienced since its founding over two centuries ago. Americans have had a unique relationship with national security that has separated them from the rest of the globe and especially its allies and fellow partners of the Western world on the European continent. The period of economic and territorial growth and expansion from the 19^th century all the way up to the time of the Cold War, beginning in the late 1940s, was a period in which the United States assumed the role of global leader and shed its policy of political isolation. The concept of security for the nation during this time period experienced a very dramatic shift into a whole new arena of domestic and international policies. National security and how it was maintained and implemented became a key point in the minds of American citizens when the Cold War broke out in 1947. However, a hundred and fifty years earlier at the beginning of the 19^th century, the idea of national security and the state of this nation were in very different forms from what we as citizens now live through and see day in and day out.

When the United States entered the 19^th century, the problems of security the nation faced were numerous and in some cases very foreign to the problems that Americans faced during the time of the Cold War. “ There had been periods, for all Americans, in which security had been problematic: the dangers of immigration in the first place, and of life on the frontier once there, the struggle for independence, secure borders, and maritime rights in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries” (Gaddis, pg 8). These security issues along with military threats from Great Britain and the wars fought on the frontier against Native American tribes were the dangers Americans faced and were the reasons for certain policies that the leaders of the nation enacted in order to suppress those threats. The policy of isolationism had been a policy of both choice and geographical fate that, except for a few violent instances, allowed the United States to remain secure within its borders and expand its level of influence and power almost entirely unhindered. “ With the exception of Pancho Villa’s raids into the Southwest in the second decade of the twentieth century and a few submarine incursions during World War 2 along the West Coast, the forty-eight contiguous states were safe from the danger of physical harm from 1814, when the British left at the end of the War of 1812, until 1957, when the successful testing of a Soviet intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) made the United States vulnerable to nuclear missile attacks” (Snow, pg.79).

Isolationism came in two forms and the political form was what allowed the United States to emerge as a separate entity from its contemporaries in Europe. American leaders wanted to build an independent nation in the North American continent, one that was independent and territorially free of the European powers and one that could compete economically. Unilateralism became a policy of necessity as Americans became aware of their vulnerability to external attacks. “ The idea here was that the United States could not rely upon the goodwill of others to secure its safety, and therefore should be prepared to act on its own” (Gaddis, pg23). Americans learned a variety of hard lessons during the fight for independence against Great Britain in the previous century and one of those lessons was to not depend on other powers to secure the future of the American nation through fighting or by any other means. America had to be secured by the strength of its citizens and its citizens alone.

The period of the 19^th century was a time of true territorial expansion and the issues of security and political isolation were coursing through the veins of the young nation and reached the surface of national consciousness as it engaged in war with Great Britain in 1812. It was in this war the United States suffered humiliating defeats and through those defeats altered its political thinking and maneuvering. When the capitol and the White House were burned by the British, having invaded the United States, American leaders were unprepared for the true impact those fires would have on the populace. “ Prior to the War of 1812, however, there was no long-term strategy linking security to expansion” (Gaddis, pg 14). A few years after the devastating war the United States issued the Monroe Doctrine, which went hand in hand with the concept of Manifest Destiny. America, and America alone, would have political and military say over both the North and South American continents and that European powers must stay out of the New World. To be a hemispherical power America had to secure its borders. Our leaders went about that mission by expanding those borders through war and conquest. However, with new conquests came new threats against the national security, which prompted new security policies to evolve and adapt to the changing political landscape.

The end of the 19^th century saw America at a national crossroads when it entered into a war with Spain in 1898, a war that transformed the United States from a continental power into a global power. America won the war quickly and decisively, acquiring the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Guam from Spain. These acquisitions brought America out of political isolation and onto the stage of the global leaders who were the European powers, which had by that point carved the world up into their own colonial empires. America had to improve upon its security policies having just gathered itself a small empire of its own. Containing and responding to external threats had spread off the continent and into the Pacific and the Caribbean. The policy of unilateralism remained intact and although America had emerged globally it did not lose that image of isolationism. The years following the Spanish-American War showed little impact from the United States in the form of global leadership or real global power until the outbreak of World War 1. World War 1 was the incident that brought the United States out of its isolationist roots, at least for a few years, and into the realm of European politics and European warfare.

The United States became involved in the Great War in 1917 and the president at the time, Woodrow Wilson, had a vision of America taking a larger role in global dealings after the war came to an end. The policy of multilateralism came into effect with American involvement in the war and this was a clear sign of America on the edge of experiencing true restructuring in the sphere of national security. However, after the war ended in 1919, America returned to the policy of isolationism just when the nation was called upon to help lead the new order that was taking place with the birth of the League of Nations. For the next twenty years the United States maintained that policy of isolationism, ignoring the call of multilateralism from Europe, as continued with policies from a past century. These policies were antiques in the face of growing aggression from the impact of the Great Depression and the rise of dictators in Europe. The outbreak of World War 2 in 1939 along with FDR in the White House was the combination that finally brought the United States into its modern role of being a global leader and a global power. Unilateralism and isolationism were superceded by multilateralism and global engagement as America fought the war on both fronts and committed the entire nation to the war effort abroad and at home.

The aftermath of the second world war brought the United States to its greatest position of power domestically as well as globally. America had reached a level of influence militarily and politically that surpassed the former great powers of Europe, all of which had been decimated by the carnage that had lasted for six years. America had become a changed nation from its experience of the war and what emerged in 1945 was a nation finally capable of filling the leadership position. National security entered a new phase of its being, and a reforming of policy had to occur. However, two years after the ending of the bloodiest conflict in modern history, the last two remaining superpowers entered into a new type of conflict that became known as the Cold War. National security took on a whole new meaning when citizens were faced with a powerful and nuclear Soviet Union accompanied by the spreading of communism to other parts of the globe. The evolution of 19^th century policies to the ones the United States created in order to face the new threat of world communism was an evolutionary path that encountered many obstacles and went down a number of political avenues. America, by the time of Cold War confrontation, was not even a shadow of its 19^th century self and the policies for security had caught up and adjusted to modern times. The evolution and shifting of the American vision on what security meant to this nation and its people had finally come to fruition with the external threat of communism, a threat that lasted for another four decades and held the populace in an attentive grip from one heartbeat to the next.

FILM REVIEW: W.

The highly critical film W., directed by Oliver Stone who portrays his vision of George W. Bush, is overrun with opinions and insight into the life as well as the political rise and fall of George W. Showing where Bush started out in life as a college drunk with little ambition to achieve anything out of his life, the film allows the viewer to see, through the directors eyes and opinion, what really motivated Bush towards and away from politics. The influence of the father George H.W. Bush came across the screen with a style of personal intensity and the relationship between father and son was shown as a major factor in the decisions made by the younger Bush throughout the rest of his life. George W. was a man on the move, never satisfied with his way of living and this rootless existence only angered the father. Bush was seen as the black sheep of the family, never able to rise to prominence in the eyes of the father, a fact that only continued to bring tension to a relationship strained by the families power within the United States. The film jumps from Bush’s past to the year 2002, when Bush’s legacy was on the rise by fighting the War on Terror and preparing for yet another war against Saddam Hussein and the nation of Iraq. Seeing the path that Bush took to become president was of great importance to the film and allowed the viewer to connect with George W. on a very personal level. There are three occasions throughout the film that show Bush in a baseball stadium in the outfield with no one in the stands yet there are sounds of cheers in the first two occasions. These occasions tie into the message of the film, which will be delved into later. The film shows that at first Bush had no political ambitions because his strained relationship with his father had completely turned him off of politics. Then as the years continued with Bush getting older, becoming a born-again Christian and giving up alcohol and making something of himself, the drive for a political career began to appear. The film shows that the decision to invade Iraq in 2003 was the peak of Bush’s legacy and that it in fact consumed his presidency and became in many eyes the mark of his political downfall. The message of the film can be seen as a reflection of those three dream-like occasions with Bush in a baseball field hearing cheers in the beginning and then hearing only silence in the end. The cheering was mirroring the rise of Bush from a lowly drunk and misfit to becoming President of the United States, the highest position in the land. Then after Bush made that fateful decision to invade Iraq, causing massive chaos in that nation as well as internal aggression within the U.S, the cheers fell silent. The message to me was that what came with that fateful choice of invasion was the abandonment of the U.S citizenry and those seen to be closest to Bush. That silence in the baseball field represented the isolation Bush was experiencing when faced with the chaos that followed the invasion and the clearly seen failures by his collective administration. Bush thought he could accomplish what his father could not in the 1991 Gulf War, and that desire to surpass the father, which was apparent throughout the film led to the downfall of George W’s presidency in the eyes of the nation as well as the Bush family. The silence in the field spoke more loudly than anything else, the isolation became real for Bush and it was shown that he knew his political career had come to a crossroads. The film was a powerful expression of a director’s vision of a president in crisis and I believe there is a lot to learn and understand from this film.

EDEN, A GARDEN OF TRUTH

Follow the path wherever it might lead and understand what fate holds to be complete. Earth and water have been ordered to appear by the heavens and to sustain life until the unknown hour. The reacting consciousness knows what can be seen and what can be removed from the light of ultimate vision. Charged energy flows within the spirit of an awakened mind, a mind that must attain oneness with the heavens offering. There will be pain that could restrict further journeys and distribute screams of suffering. One must overcome such suffering and fully commit to the essence of the spirits inner meaning. Misguided devotion to a reflection of soft light draws out the poison of self-loathing and self-doubt. God and the shadows that surround such a belief conceal a hidden presence of ancient truth to human evolution. Myths provide our path as a species with a guide of cosmic inheritance. Time delivers a recovery of continued searching and continued questioning.

All humans are connected through a common bond of emerging life that has arrived at a threshold to divinity locked within perfection. The rule of law has been broken by mans greed for a precise route to the soul of the universe. The song of the heavens repeats its rhythm to the collective of light that contains our nameless horizon. Shatter the conviction of tomorrow and fulfill the prophecy of today. Our planet is illuminated by the substance of an unknown pattern forging beneath the darkness. The mentality of Time, a concept that releases ever increasing mystery, has become blind to the pattern and its very survival is at stake. Refusing to admit fault in the understanding of Time's plan for human evolution is a flaw in the character of our species. A golden age of consciousness may be found through the next step taken towards a perception of human potential, a perception grasped by a language not yet spoken along our path.

The elements of the Earth fall into an unstructured presence that allows for the liberation of infinite wisdom. This skin is only temporary while this soul transcends the discussion of whose religion is purest in truth. WAKE UP HUMANITY AND CONTROL THAT TEMPTATION TO CLOSE YOUR EYES! Forgive the ignorance of many and connect with the cosmic scheme laid out before us. Eden, a garden of truth may be just a myth but it conceals within its story a chance to question our right to exist with an awakened mind. To feel oneness with the Earth means that the sound of that heavenly song is finally heard within the spirit and to believe in a greater energy does not mean its name is God. To name that energy is to lessen its influence on the minds thirst for projected knowledge.

The voice begins to chant a verse of conflicted movement in the direction of naked light entering a mystic source. Support layers covering the chaos woven into the thread of Time are beginning to break apart and experience uncertainty. Interpretations of today's transcendence develop a sight of isolation and the ending is drawing near. The rising of total consciousness is within personal observance, combining many answers with many conclusions. Drink in the poetry of life and stand before an intrusion of transforming moments. Tranquility of the lasting mind has finally arrived and the dancing shadows mirror the fire of a caged thought being freed. The release is the final expression of divine communication and the dying light of the sun turns to recognize its place in the soul of the universe, as this mind listens to the revelations changing course with enduring awareness and an abundance of truth.

INFINITE SACRIFICE

Life, a risk of the senses and a tool of fate now becomes a perfect vision created by tranquility. Morning light tears through the shadows as a calm breeze settles on a summer cycle. There is a state of creation at this moment, a moment immersed underneath the haze of infinite sacrifice. Nature rises up in redemption as an arrangement of historic images proceed with purpose through the mind. Symbols of the Great Mother confront these awakened eyes, though the awareness of dawn insures the skull a trip inside humanity. What provides humanity with a universal high designed to translate the Earth's language to our consciousness is a separateness from the modern world.

OIL, BLOOD AND GREED

The greed and circus surrounding a single commodity drives the blood and bullets far. Oil, the source that is dominating billions of minds and whose essence dictates policy on a global scale has entered our lives with lightening precision. Prices rise and fall as our eyes lay witness to the crime of the century being performed brilliantly by a handful of unrestricted companies. Endless speeches of little faith are ushered into our thoughts from the mouths of oil lobbyists, pure and genuine criminals seen in the flesh. Death and opportunity surround the black liquid, a form of unique inspiration for great and terrible things that have come and passed. Where have the voices for liberty gone in these dire days of political corruption and illusionary freedom? Change could appear on the streets of D.C. and one can still find that vision of pride from being born in this nation. Creation and discovery remain immune to the blades of self-doubt. People need to feel the future within their veins and so the dependence on foreign chaos continues. Inspiration to a grateful generation has appeared at rallies and on the television screens. Obama is the center of a committed movement determined to take back the White House. The Bush Administration is on its last dying breath and we will be there to witness its final political destruction. Conflicts arise out of the ashes from previous dealings with universal fate. A Coup had been orchestrated and carried out over eight years ago and that crime is now slowly becoming undone by the political will of the masses. Sickness with what transpires in the name of democracy takes a firm hold and maintains dominance. Nature suffers from the hands of industrial progress, a mistake that is all too clear and true. When will citizens cease allowing energy monopolies to control their daily lives with no remorse in their actions?

First Amendment Discussion

The First Amendment ensures that as citizens of the United States we have the right to free speech, which is a valuable tool of state for any individual living within a democracy. Journalists, protected by the First Amendment and what it projects onto society, are able to express their opinions using various forms of the mass media. When thinking of the First Amendment and what it allows me to do as a student and a writer, I tend to picture countries without the right to free speech. Governments and nations that don’t recognize that right and react with censoring, imprisonment, and violence, reinforces my belief in what the amendment stands for. The Law protects writers and journalists who speak out about their views on politics and religious beliefs. This blanket of protection opens the door for a flow of opinions and protests to consume the web and airwaves, eventually filling up numerous sites, shows, and blogs. There are many blogs posted and discussions held online that take the shape of false information and dangerous remarks. These comments, whatever and whoever they may be directed at, still fall under that protective right.

The “novice journalists”, which are the individuals blogging and keeping those online discussions alive, should continue without interference with what their doing. I don’t want there to be a form of censorship that covers the web, in turn exerting too much authority over a public domain. There are some of those novice writers who I feel simply spill out nonsense and are always corrupting the idea of truth and proven facts with lies. I do believe that those people should be shut out. However, once that starts and certain individuals are quieted, a chain reaction will take place that will drastically change the face of the web and how it functions for everyone. That being said I would not trade how the web performs today just to have individuals who believe and profess President Obama is a Nazi to be silenced, even if that would benefit the country as well as our collective intelligence.

SPIRITUAL MOVEMENT

Suspended in a vision of quiet bliss

Misplaced by a welcomed dream

Warmth from a blanket of illusion

Memories race towards the door

Faces unknown smile with affection

Trains speed across the patient tracks

Mountains remain still with age

Valleys are covered by the monsoon

A billion people with eyes of growth

Traveling through a continent of culture

Mirrors of British rule seem so long ago

Colors of wonder hanging on every sight

Watching children play in crowded streets

History remembered by architecture of beauty

Rivers flowing with the gift of life

Farmers tending their sacred earth

Time forgotten as each day passes

Language used as a step to knowledge

Gandhi’s words remain a foundation of truth

Mystics are roaming those scattered hills

Speaking to a wise man blinded by night

Frightened birds spread their wings to the sky

Surroundings of Asia take away my mind

Echoes of the morning disappear

Mystery is revealed to a wanderer

Delicacies of an ancient people are served

The smells of the city now consume

Delhi has become a haven of ecstasy

People unravel their tales and riddles

Merchants sell stolen memories to the youth

Distant lands stay along the edge of thought

Three suns slip by exchanging fire

The universe explodes into my minds eye

Louder the sounds ripple across the land

Jungles conceal tigers ready to hunt

Palm trees fall beneath the Elephants feet

Running faster these hands grab the clock

Suddenly winter is seen as snow commands

The trip is over yet its impression remains

I experienced the soul of India within a dream as

Spiritual movement flowed through my veins

SHACKLES OF BABYLON: A Poem written during the Bush Era

Authority tries to persuade our minds away

We see the truth of many devastating failures

Moved by the thought of this nation changing

These eyes wait to receive that beauty of sight

The capitol is under siege from demanding voices

Senators are placed in a position to create peace

Music of protest echoes the sound of our time

Newspapers print the deaths of innocent souls

Young men and women are given guns to kill

Iraqis in the streets scream with their blood

American families look on as chaos erupts

Dragged under the sand have been our thoughts

Tanks move into position to shatter more homes

Insurgents remain calm as an attack is planned

Threats from Iran are as clear as the silent moon

Two more soldiers die from a crashing plane

Evil smiles with a grin of pure hatred

To stay the course remains a quote of illusion

The presidential strategy is formed by failure

Buried reasons for war are in our conscience

Silence distracts the mind from its duty

Freedom is the foundation of our lives

War corrupts the heart as citizens speak out

Tears now drip from a young widows face

Reading of how her husband gave his life

Children breathe sorrow for those who fell

The region is slowly becoming a powder keg

World War Three could slip in unnoticed

Escalating madness through an ancient land

Beggars for peace shout across the sand

Provinces ripped apart by secular violence

Civil war spreads like a wildfire of death

A religious riff for over a thousand years

Mistrust runs deep through all of Baghdad

Faith in stability is a belief unfulfilled

Confusion for the future is at every turn

An exit for the troops must be revealed

For we are now in the shackles of Babylon

CONFUSION OF DEMOCRACY

Shattered by the thought of false representation

Unknown corruption forming beneath capitol dome

Senators paying off prostitutes with promises

Protests in the form of a clear mirage

Forty years of growth with nothing learned

Empty words voiced at the State of the Union

Lost within the confusion of democracy

The face of incompetence seen on the screen

A caravan of lies passes through our minds

To stay the course can only end with defeat

Waiting are the hands and voice of the youth

Who will break the capitols walls if not us?

Nations drift away from our scarred shores

Secrets remain hidden by the White House

Wine drips from my lips now in shock

More troops sent to slowly meet death

Waiting are bullets from a thousand eyes

Peace is a memory ripped apart

The present time echoes the march of war

Listen for the changing winds now silent

Laughter is still forgotten by the innocent

Awake we have become from the darkness

Brought to the edge by misdirection

Mirroring the ruin of ancient Rome

The desert holds our fate secure

Escalation has become the only option

Solutions have been thrown to the wolves

Blood screams our young soldiers’ pain

Comfort will come when war is ended

Foreign policy has been consumed by greed

Future unclear and the present a nightmare

Vietnam is a name of great importance

Iraq is slowly becoming its equal

Freedom stands for an illusion of power

Blinded for years no longer an excuse

Morning a crimson shade with the rising tide

These quiet beaches far from the desert

Plans of destruction formed in caves

Walking with despair creeping behind

Face to face with the hatred of many

Billions spent in the blink of an eye

A nations recovery buried far away

Making a change is our sole path

Beginning with our minds now set free

FILM REVIEW: ACROSS THE UNIVERSE

Across the Universe, a film inspired by the turbulent and changing times of the 1960s as well as the music of The Beatles, is a moveable feast of visual energy coming off the screen along with excellent musical ensembles performed by a host of unique characters. The driving force of the film is a love story trying to survive both the cultural and political revolutions that swept through and gripped the United States in that time of great upheaval. The film sold me personally on the first Beatle note sung, for the simple fact that the Beatles are the first band/music I ever listened to and they remain to this day an essential and critical influence on my writing and myself. The film is a reflection of the meaning to those many songs created and performed by the Beatles and how those musical interpretations mirrored the times in what I felt was an accurate light. There are a number of references to real life individuals that made their mark in politics and music during the later part of the 60s; individuals such as Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Ken Kesey, Timothy Leary and members of the anti-war movement. The names of characters are taken from certain Beatles songs, which allow for the musical performances to contain an important element of merit to the band and the times. The story revolves around a group of people who have found their way to a New York City apartment, either to keep running from their lives or in other cases to bring a sense of rebirth to their lives. The story then follows the paths taken by those individuals and how they all experienced a strong taste of what the 60s had to offer both freely and forcibly. Every song held and expressed a message that captured the specific scene and the specific purpose behind that scene. The impact of the Vietnam War shaped the stories of the characters and tore the feeling of love apart between the two main characters Jude and Lucy. Lucy’s brother Max got drafted to go to Vietnam and as the other characters experienced the changing atmosphere of the 60s back in the states Max saw the continued killings and horrors of war, horrors that maimed many a good men during that time. The student revolts that exploded on college campuses, the anti-war movement efforts against the government and the government’s reaction through the use of police were all clearly captured on film.

The film in my opinion showed the parallel lines between love, politics, drugs and the feeling of being caught up in a whirlwind of life during a time and age of cultural resistance and experiencing what freedom really means to certain people. All those aspects of the film capture and express that sense of freedom and how living that freedom has its rewards as well as its consequences. The message of love enduring over terrible times and situations and how by just experiencing that sense of love one could overcome any type of problems that may arise was seen throughout the films entirety and is what I believe the main message of the film. The one song that captures that message is “All You Need Is Love”, a 1967 Beatles song that I feel encircles the film and its many characters. Love prevailed over the horrors of war and the dissolution that fell upon the characters during that time of war. Love brought together two people separated by land and politics and ensured that a true love connection didn’t fade away. Love made a family out of strangers who were in search of a family. Prevailing by the blessings of fate and karma this film brought to me a foundation of a message that continues to this day. What we as a people need to survive in this world is that belief that all we need is love.

FILM REVIEW: REEL RADICALS

The film Reel Radicals, an intense documentary about the revolution that was the 1960s being portrayed in certain films is a keen insight into a time of great upheaval and collective changes in society as well as the art of filmmaking. Sex, drugs, youthful rebellion against the old ways/tradition, anti-war fever and racial inequality were all caught on film and released with a true sense of conviction. This documentary shows how the whole foundation of filmmaking was drastically altered as a result of the changing times and that the method of making and viewing films would never be the same again. The question of whether the films influenced the revolution or the revolution influenced the films is a powerful and thought provoking question. I believe there is a balance of influence between the two and that each succeed and failed as a result of that balancing influence. During the 1960s the concept of breaking the rules and reworking the game of life, politics and society was everywhere and there was little escaping it. A revolution from the ground up was in the works and when that revolution finally struck Hollywood the revolt was in clear view with a direct message, break down the walls of old and reshape what could and could not be accepted by the viewing public. Concepts such as Neo-Realism were taking a foothold in post war Europe and an element of dark poetry entwined with human reality was coming off the screen in those European theatres. Foreign films that were really pushing the boundaries in Europe were having a profound impact on the new class of filmmakers in the United States, an impact that would take our culture here in the states and bring a new radical light of thought and expression to it. The concept of freedom in its purest form could be seen with the move to escapism and living outside of the current society’s realm by the new breed of filmmakers in the states. Films such as Midnight Cowboy showed a darker side of society and how living on that edge of society is something that could either bring rebirth to the spirit or leave it hollow, which brilliantly fed the concept of escapism and brought an ugly and new revelation of society to a global audience. The message of the film for me was a direct connection with those ideas, emotions and artistic intentions felt and experienced during a cultural revolution that continues to impact our modern society as a whole. The film shows where rules were broken and barriers torn down in a successful attempt at reshaping the way people think and feel in a time when fighting off conformity was seen as a necessity by many. Sex became an issue thrown into the faces of common day people and they were given the option of either ignoring or indulging that issue, which was considered highly taboo before the 1960s. The message of the film for me is fight off the grip of conformity and question the society you live in. Don’t take anything at face value and delve into your own culture with an intention to truly experience it. I could hear, see and understand the revolution of art, music and politics that was transpiring during that critical moment in our nations history as well as the history of the world. The influence films have on a culture and the influence that culture reflects back on those films continue to have bearing in my time and I take that fact with great purpose. Those films that originated out of the turbulence of the 1960s have profoundly changed my life and this documentary highlighted what it meant to experience freedom in a time of chaos and love, which has great merit in our current time and global crises.

FILM REVIEW: WAG THE DOG

Wag the Dog is a political film that incorporates politics and the art of Hollywood producing, a combination that together successfully shaped an election and altered the American perception of reality within the film. There are two main characters that pooled their resources into a combined effort to win an election and keep the status quo for politics in Washington. Robert De Niro, whose character is named Conrad Brean, is a fixer, someone called in to clean up a political scandal and assure those he works for that his job won’t become common knowledge by others in Washington as well as the American people. The scandal that needs fixing is the President is accused of having relations with an underage girl in the White House ten days before the election that would give him another term in office. Conrad comes up with the plan to start a fictitious war with the nation of Albania, a war that would distract the public from the Presidents scandal and ensure his reelection by emerging victorious in the “war”. The group of White House staff working around Conrad are ordered to come up with motives for a fake war with Albania and Conrad himself suggests they meet with a Hollywood producer to orchestrate the background of the “conflict” for the American voters. Dustin Hoffman plays Hollywood producer Stanley Motss, a man who has never received credit for his work in films and sees a chance to do something great by manipulating the election through his filming of an Albanian war. After surprising setbacks, reforming their approach to maintain the upper hand and staying one step ahead of the American people, Conrad and Stanley’s plan worked, giving the President another term.

The message that I came away with after viewing this film was that the line between politics and an alternate reality from Hollywood is thin, so thin that the media could manipulate our thoughts and the peoples voice could get lost. Stanley Motts was a master at bringing the public what they wanted to hear, even if it wasn’t the truth and that it in fact deceived their minds. The public was brought along for a Hollywood ride that ended in an election win for a corrupt politician and the death of a producer, Stanley, who only wanted to be recognized for his masterpiece of political deception and artwork. Being a political science student and having a profound interest for journalism I had a chord struck by this film with its’ mocking of the political system moving along the surface of the film’s entirety. Conrad found a way through the system, broke it by changing the rules of the political game and by taking the back channel he was able to allow for corruption to flourish. Throughout my own personal writings on politics over the years I have taken a stance against the corruption I believe prospers in the political arena in America, and this film left me with a deeper understanding on just how easy it is for the media to dictate collective opinion. The film was portraying how the media can at one moment be on the side of truth and then the next being used to alter an election. The message of back channel corruption and political deception was clearly seen in the film, which I believe is necessary to show viewers so that people can get an understanding on just how vulnerable the system is to corruption. I thought this was a powerful film that performs the task of informing people on how fragile their democracy is and how we should stand alert in order to maintain our voice in a free and honest society.

DALI STAMPED WASTELAND

The wasteland that is this Dali stamped mind has submerged itself within the ripple effect of sound. Hollow doors lead through arches made by the breaking of stone. Something in the water controls the way these eyes read in between the lines. The Earth has provided a craving appetite with those catchings from the ocean of mortality. Complexion of the face gives off a warning in dealing with the dark side of the sun. A map of culture allows the spoils of dreams to be received by all who truly seek the reduction in false knowledge. Traveling on now and trekking through those dunes which carry the myth of quicksand deep inside their totality.

NORTH SHORES REFLECTION

The color white blinds the surfers as they attempt an escape from the barrel. Sunset, Pipe, these are the names that ignite the blood of the surfing legions loyal to the giving ocean. Brave souls look to the crippling waves and question if riding out will end with life or death. Shadows form the distant outlines of a coast riddled by natures fury. The waters of Sunset lure my friends to test their skills in owning the movement of the pacific ocean. West coast girls trek across this preserved sand and grin at the ongoing sport of living on the Edge. They, the ones feeding off that edge, need to feel the crest of the wave guiding their muscles beneath their sacred boards. Those boards, which have entered the pacifics grip, are what divides the solid touch of the beach and the roaring pulse of the waves. Silence does occur. However it is gone a moment later when the hurricane of sound that is North Shore announces its presence by breaking surfer bones. Calm structures that house these maniacs of the surf remain motionless, as their owners become one with the current of Nature.

ENDLESS HIGHWAYS/ SERVANTS TO THE CLOCK

Tired and in translation, the limits of this mind are being explored. Endless highways create pleasure of the open road. Left without purpose, this existence is becoming questioned by unforeseen events. Smells and tastes from previous experiences permit these eyes to look over a crippled past. The tune is familiar and the song appears to have been written for it to stay continuous. Energy flashes like a universal hurricane, breaking down those chained thoughts. The dark beer enters this form with willing signs of intoxication. The city is half alive as the night burns through those lingering clouds and surrounds our beach that is still seen from ancient times. Lost and off track, only my personal humility can survive another dawn dressed in the influence of depression. Loud sirens crusade down streets littered with palm trees and one asks where the accident occurred. Minutes produce false hope, encouraging the propaganda that we are servants to the clock. The truth is the propaganda is reversed and that freedom from traditional thinking is only hidden from a confused sense of view. Echoes race up towards the mountain and shatter the silence known as Makiki. Need a flight out and destined for nowhere. Alarms from stolen cars again bring rebirth to that orgy of sound, which is in its darkest hour. The fire pours out its eternal smoke into the cup of a troubled soul. Solomon’s Temple reflects modern day chaos, teaching the present that only in the past correctable answers are found. Traveling on, into the deep whisper of emptiness. Rings of commitment consume my friends mind and his decision is held tightly within the elements. What comes next? Life is zeroing down upon this tiny island and radical motions are being felt. Sand digs its way in between these toes, leaving the noticeable feeling of oneness with nature. There are no companions who have seen what I have seen, which separates an intellectual connection from a myth turned true. Lost and in a medical daze, the blood rushes into a restricted channel. I beg the morning to soon roll the dice and allow there to be another chance to collect. Honolulu tries to bury its forgotten on the sides of streets for all visitors to smile at with cameras. The ocean moves without explanation or sympathy for those who cannot enter its depth. The tide approaches our feast of the flesh as Halloween too begins revealing its hidden tricks. A New Direction is required for a man who has replaced all confidence in living with a feeling of desired sleep. Though the Renaissance age is long dead, the bright rumor of a dejavu image slipping into these ascending years could somehow allow for optimism to conquer all. Distractions from the inevitable deter the persistence of truth from releasing its poem of a failed youth. Paid by a ruined self-peace, the mind must now find a ticket to ride. The moon seems jailed and locked within a permanent choice, does it reflect light or admit to being only a dead rock? No more can be said on this dying night, so remember to adjust that spoken thought to the grip of natural light and hold securely on for that mysterious movement into the dawn.

THE IMPACT OF TECHNOLOGY

Technology is a force of invention that cannot be ignored either in today’s world or in the not so distant future. No matter where you end up in this current stream of globalization, signs of the technological revolution are everywhere. Villages in the remotest parts of Africa have cell phones. Communities living in the mountains of India have access to computers and are able to communicate beyond those towering heights. These changes in global society, through the continuing impact of modern technology, have reshaped past thinking into a norm of far reaching possibilities. As a student and an individual in the 21^st century I can’t avoid the use of certain devices such as: computers, the Internet, cell phones, cars, television, and the radio. I have become dependent on these various devices in order to survive in both the academic and the working worlds, a fact that I don’t always welcome with an open mind. I use my cell phone to make the long distance calls to relatives and friends living in other countries. My access to email on the computer performs this valued function as well, which in some ways is more efficient. Everyday I use the computer to carry on with my four online courses, where the computer acts as a feature of complete necessity. Having that option to take courses online while I’m away from Hawaii insures for me a graduation date. Additionally, I use the computer to stay informed on global issues by scanning the net and its numerous sites for any bit of news. This gift from the Internet, the ability to learn about, explore, and communicate with people thousands of miles away, is essential for me who wants to after I graduate immerse myself in the field of writing and professional journalism.

Although I use these forms of technology daily, requiring their services with great need, that need traps me into a pattern of unbalanced dependency that sometimes backfires without warning. Cell phones and computers randomly lose connection and fail. Cars break down. The Internet doesn’t always contain the information I seek. Many people I know believe that we as a civilization have found a common ground with technology where its very existence will solve all our problems. I’ve learned through years of troubled experience to disagree with that statement when it’s presented as fact. Yes technology has brought us into the 21^st century as an advanced civilization in which our global sense of community has been forever altered. However, our total commitment to, belief in, and critical dependence on this groundbreaking technology reflects a false sense of over indulgence. Technology changes by the minute as one system is transformed into another. This is both a blessing and a curse. In order to stay a head of the curve you have to maintain a constant watch on these systems. This mandate to learn quickly or fall behind is where I struggle with technology. Despite these challenges I do value what technology has to offer me in which my life has benefited from many times over.

Excerpts from Fear And Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson

"Strange memories on this nervous night in Las Vegas. Five years later? Six? It seems like a lifetime, or at least a Main Era- the kind of peak that never comes again. San Francisco in the middle sixties was a very special time and place to be apart of. Maybe it meant something. Maybe not, in the long run…but no explanation, no mix of words or music or memories can touch that sense of knowing that you were there and alive in that corner of time and the world. Whatever it meant…History is hard to know, because of all the hired bullshit, but even being sure of “history” it seems entirely reasonable to think that every now and then the energy of a whole generation comes to a head in a long fine flash, for reasons nobody really understands at the time- and which never explain, in retrospect, what actually happened.

There was madness in any direction, at any hour. If not across the Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda…You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning…And that, I think, was the handle- that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting- on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave…So now, less than five years later, you can go on up a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark- that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back."

These pieces of writing from Hunter Thompson, taken from the same monologue though separated in the book, have always spoken to me through the flowing of his words into the story behind the man’s vision of his time, the 1960s. Hunter’s style of short but precise sentences where the reader can understand the thought that provoked the words penetrates the mind with a creative mastery of the English language. Hunter Thompson was a journalist who incorporated himself into the story he was covering, essentially making the story about himself, which has since been deemed the Gonzo version of modern journalism. Hunter achieved his well-deserved niche in journalism with his keen insight into the heart of America, and he never failed to deliver his exceptional wit on current politics, news and sports. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas was the first piece of writing I read from Hunter and to this day I still say that it is his best collection of wild thoughts put forth by a man intrigued by the madness of what he saw as the United States of America. Hunter reformed and reshaped journalism by simply allowing his thoughts to come to paper in a stream of consciousness as these selections from his book reveal. His art was critically well received and he managed to stay in the arena of journalism for over five decades before his death in 2005. Hunter had the style of a wild poet who used his talents to tell stories in a journalistic fashion and whether those stories were fact or fiction we just couldn’t ignore his driven mind. Hunter was there for the transforming of our nation from certain events such as the agony of the Vietnam War to the downfall of Richard Nixon. He followed all the news that concerned the survival of the American spirit and he was one of those individuals who continued to keep that spirit above the surface.

NEWS AND THE WORLD

Today I see the news, appearing in its many circulated forms, as a critical element to our society in which my generation should learn to approach it with a mature and opinionated understanding. The news has a global impact in the sense that it connects billions of people with a worldwide network of stories. The news has a deep seeded responsibility to inform the reader and viewer of what the facts are relating to the story. Reporters and writers should not ignore the facts by expanding upon a story with lies and fabrications in order to simply circulate the story to a wider audience. For that very reason I view the National Enquirer along with related outlets as blatant scars on the news industry. Many journalists, as a result of the shift in our societies attitude, are leaning more towards entertaining rather than informing the reader. The story and the reporter should be of the un-bias nature and remain committed to the truth. Presentation of the news has been transformed from the style our parents experienced at our age. We have inherited a changing atmosphere in how our news is regulated, processed and released into our homes and into our minds. The rise of televised/online news, along with the decline of print, has in many ways provided millions more with necessary access.

There is a clear difference between print and televised news. I find that televised news has become a playground for commentators to speak their propaganda across the screen, reshaping stories to fit their needs and the needs of their corporate backers. The division among certain televised news outlets such as CNN and Fox News has spilt the populace and their informed opinion. A battleground on the air has ceased to end and I for one am in a rage over the affront they are making on common sense. I’ve stopped watching news presented on the television almost altogether for one reason alone, I can’t seem to get any profound and concrete information worthy of being called news. Commentators such as Wolf Blitzer or Glenn Beck are just a bad taste in my mouth. They spin their biases into contorted stories, eventually forcing my hand to the remote and hearing the sound of the television going silent. I find most of my news that is thrown around on the different televised outlets from John Stewart and Stephen Colbert. Yes they are entertainers I know, but they manage to inform me of what is happening in our nation and the world without trying to sell me their own opinion. I respect that and I’m sticking by it, in which I think a good majority of my generation does as well. I respond more to print news or news I find on the online sites for the BBC or the New York Times. I find a cleaner sense of truth coming from the page or the computer screen and I become informed of a story without being told how I should feel and react to it.

For the most part, I have to say that, yes, the core elements of the news being in the form of impact, timeliness, prominence, proximity, conflict, and currency are all relevant and necessary. I can’t say, however, that if a story is bizarre or of the unusual nature that it should be labeled news worthy. Just because something happened that is completely wild and entertaining does not mean that news agencies should spill it out in mass, claiming it as being important enough to report on.

My peers are of a generation that is consumed by media sources. I am always searching for news on Middle East conflicts and stories that affect our nation and the world on a current basis. I can’t say if my generation is all together overly concerned with the critical issues that are impeding on our rights and our lives. Some of my friends are involved in the process of interpreting the news that is presented to us and they try to stay ahead of the curve on current issues. My generation as a whole must become more informed to the news, both in the style of print and televised broadcast. They should move away from the entertaining value of the news and try to grasp the deeper meaning behind the stories and the outcomes from those stories.

I like the fact that there are many different outlets for me to receive news stories, providing choices and options in the world of expanding media. The main aspect of the news that I would change is somehow finding a way to restructure televised news into a form of media that presents news without continuously conflicted propaganda. I want to hear the news reported with unscripted facts, not the dangerously bias words from men such as Glen Beck, who uses his voice to scare the populace into embracing his ideals and not the news. Commentators must be given regulations and restrictions on the kinds of messages they are spreading to the citizenry. Truth in reporting must be practiced on a complete scale throughout televised outlets. What I want to see and hear from the television is the truth given without any hindrance or bias, allowing me to interpret the news with my own thoughts and not those of someone trying to sell me a fictional version of the very truth I seek.