MINDSETS

With a genuine degree of certainty, many of us Homo sapiens pride ourselves as being the most intelligent and adaptable species to inhabit this planet and its environment which actually is much too complicated for our evolving minds to comprehend more than a small portion to permit us to construct mindsets that should always remain inquisitive and flexible as we have reached a stage where we can create new windows to view, and try to understand, new bits of puzzling reality. The Cosmos: One of many examples of this are the astronomers who selected a large area of our sky that appeared empty of stars both to our eyes and to the instruments we had built. Using the Hubble telescope that orbits the earth every 97 minutes they took 7,500 exposures over 16 years that revealed 263,000 galaxies each with over a billion stars, too far away to be detected by previous methods. This recently reported data has yet to overwhelm earth-based mindsets. It is so much more normal to settle for the data available from our acceptable, criticized, hated, praised, tolerated, media. One highly-praised example of media benefits was: “Chez Helene”: a 1959-1973 Canadian Broadcasting Company, Montreal TV show that presented over 4,000 15-minute weekday programs featuring a bilingual English-French family and designed to promote bilingualism. Florence Nightingale, 1820-1010: During the Crimean War, 1854-56, ten times as many soldiers were dying from diseases and infections than from battle. Of the 1,650,000 British, French, Ottoman Empire, and Sardinian troops who fought, 900,000 died. In the failed October 1854 British charge at Balaclava of the Light Brigade, made famous by Lord Tenneson, of the 670 who fought 110 were killed, 160 wounded, plus 375 horses lost. Tenneson’s poem included “Theirs was not to wonder why. Theirs was but to do or die,” The war was another Western European attempt to prevent Russia from retaining warm-water ports. Florence and her older sister, Frances Parthenope (Greece), were named for their birth towns by a family in the British political corps. Their parents were strong supporters of top education for women. Florence grew up a prolific author with a strong desire to help others. She became a close friend of the the Secretary of War who encouraged her to donate her medical knowledge to Crimea. With 38 nurses she trained Florence arrived in November 1854 to find hospital staffs overworked, sanitation non existent, food and accommodation poor. She had a prefabricated hospital built in Britain and shipped to the war zone. Its death rate was one tenth that of the other hospitals. Among her sanitation steps was hand washing. She was also admired for making nightly lamplight rounds of patients. After returning to Britain she influenced the design of hospitals and sanitation in working-class homes. Kozue Akibayashi is the International President of WILPF (the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom which was founded in 1915 in the Hague when over 1,300 women pleaded for an end to the Great War (WW1) . She is a feminist researcher/activist and has worked on issues of gender and peace. She is a professor at the Graduate School of Global Studies, Doshisha University, in Kyoto, Japan. Akibayashi was a delegate to Women Cross DMZ. She has long protested the grossly inadequate exposure of, and compensation for, the millions of Comfort Women forced to provide sexual intercourse to Japanese troops throughout the vast areas occupied by Japan, and the current U.S. and Japanese militarism in Okinawa. Attempts to End The Great War: Pope Benedict XV tried to end WW1 calling it a useless slaughter. On Christmas eve 1914 French and British troops could see decorations and hear Christmas music and singing coming from the German trench. At first light Christmas morning they saw unarmed German soldiers emerging from their trenches and walking towards the British trenches shouting “Merry Christmas”. The British set aside their weapons and the two groups mingled all day exchanging gifts and souvenirs, They even organized a football game. Nightfall forced the troops back to their barracks. An artillery barrage was set up to blast away the truce and remind participants that future such activities would merit their execution. 70 million men were mobilized, 9 million combatants were killed as well as 13 million direct civilians. Up to 100 million died in genocides and the spanish flu. Dr. Anthony Fauci, born 24 Dec 1940 in New York City, has been Director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984 navigating a controversial career that included death threats and strong critics finally agreeing with him. From 1983 to 2002 he was the 13th most cited among 3 million scientific authors. In Jan 2020 he helped form the White House Coronavirus Task Force. Wanting to remain aloof from politics, Fauci criticized a Trump political ad featuring him. This annoyed Trump who then belittled Fauci’s science and viris warnings. Non-Voters: I have met a number of eligible voters so disillusioned with all politicians that they plan to avoid voting in the current U.S. federal election. Fossil Fuels: President Trump plans to open for oil and gas drilling 1.5 million acres of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. The Natural Resources Defense Council has fought for over 35 years to maintain the coastal plain safe for its Gwich’in people. Its polar bears and its cross-border Porcupine Caribou herd. In the Yukon and Northwest Territories the Gwich’in are a First Nation, in Alaska a Native People. If elected Joe Biden will deny exploitation of this resource. The five major Canadian banks, led by the Royal Bank of Canada, are pledging not to finance any attempt to drill. Ye Olde Scribe