Everybody says the election campaign is heating up. In America that has come to mean that the Republicans will start even more spinning and lying and fear mongering and dividing and pandering to everyone's basest fears and insecurities for political gain. We've been living with that for eight years and two questionably won presidential campaigns and now we're at it again. We see, for instance, Obama being criticized for being TOO popular overseas. Are we addicted to being hated because we're addicted to being feared? Only people who make a secret religion of militarism would assume that serving honorably in the military and suffering in prison qualifies someone to run a government. Are we addicted to not seeming too smart...or in fact not BEING too smart...as in not knowing that Iraq and Pakistan don't have a common border, or numerous other incorrect statements that McCain has made in recent days and months? Is it elitism to try to get your facts straight, or eating healthy food for that matter, and be open to considering and reconsidering your position through open communication? (more...)

Many years ago when Naropa Institute was just getting going as a Buddhist center of higher learning out in Boulder Colorado, I went to hear Gregory Bateson, to my mind of of the great thinkers of the 20th Century, talk there. Amidst his eloquent goings on, he cautioned us young people that if we were ever going to have a psychotic episode, we should try not to do it while in America, lest we get swept into its so-called Mental Health system and never return. He taught, from an anthropological point of view, about the variety of ways different cultures had for dealing with freaked out people, and how such problems were often held and healed in traditional ways. To be honest, I don't remember exactly what he said in any detail, but I remember being permanently struck by his admonishment to stay away from American concepts of Mental Illness, Mental Health, and Mental Health Care. (more...)