Read the full text of Martin Luther King Jr.'s 1964 Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance Speech
We must accept finite disappointment,see photo larger: Cultural Transformation Shift
but we must never lose infinite hope.
– Martin Luther King Jr.
Imagine Nonviolent Solutions
To President Obama and Administration:[I also wrote another one yesterday, viewable at this link: Letter to the President, as Posted on Facebook]
I believe that war is an outmoded and archaic way to deal with dispute. The USA has a serious problem in its relationship with the world - because our government seems to be content to enable a corporatist policy of global dominance. Under the policy of global dominance, some few act as though they are entitled to receive state support for their efforts to "take without asking" (of material and other resources) - and to exert political and economic influence on sovereign peoples/nations/lands.
That's imperialism. It hurts people. It's very sad.
I strongly believe that a "hands off" approach is a far better way to approach international relationships. No coercive pressure. No economic exploitation. The disparity in wealth between rich and poor is astronomical - and I strongly believe that the massive riches of some is all too often NOT based purely on merit.
The extreme wealth of a very small class of people is based more purely on single-minded (and unregulated) ambition. The extreme wealth is based on a willingness to dominate others and "put others down" (including the natural environment.) The tremendous treasure of those few is based in economically exploitative behaviors that, when all is said and done, serve only an individual's economic interest. Some people's wealth comes at the expense of the well-being of others. It's an arrangement that is very far from copacetic.
Please stop the torturing and the bombing. It's a horrible disservice to humanity.
We can choose to go in the direction of truth, love, hope and justice. Or we can continue this horrible decay of war and environmental abuses. We have a choice. Please, President Obama and Administration, use your voice. Lead America toward the right choice. Lead away from violence, fear, and hate. Lead toward kindness, love, truth, justice and peace. Show us that you are not profiteers by clamping down on these tremendously harmful behaviors.
In Afghanistan - there is no military solution short of total destruction, and that is not a solution at all. So there is no military solution. Many people of Afghanistan hate the Taliban. But many of them have come to hate America even more. American soldiers have been told that the way to win the war is to make people fear them more than anyone else. To rule by fear. It's not the way to make friends - nor is it the way to peace.
Does the USA want peace, or does the USA want domination? It's a serious question. The only rational interpretation is that the USA wants domination. The USA can't have it both ways. It's either domination or peace. They don't go hand in hand.
Please choose the path of peace. Please show us the caring spirit that exists in the hearts of all human beings. Please demonstrate your concern for the well-being of all people.
The situation is serious. The planet's ecological systems are in crisis. We need to confront the problem of perpetual economic growth and come to understand that it is antithetical to sustainability. Instead of growth dependent markets, we would do well to transition to a steady state economy.
Thank you.
Dear President Obama, and Members of the Obama Administration,
I have hope. I believe in Change. I believe that we can heal the world. Yes we can!
But not without challenging the unjust status quo. Take for example the wealth discrepancy between rich and poor. It is astronomical. It's almost unfathomable and it takes great powers of conceptualization in order to comprehend. It's iniquitous, and I believe, totally indefensible.
Please take some concrete steps toward change that I can believe in.
Please do not continue this landslide toward war, profligacy and environmental degradation. That's not change. War is waste and pollution, and it's just more of the same.
The United States spends more on military than the entire rest of the world combined. This is unacceptable to me. It cannot be logically argued that the military might of the USA exists solely for the purposes of legitimate defense. These military expenditures are immoral, and a betrayal of common ethical values. Military policies and practices are hurting people, and it's just not right.
Please, take concrete steps toward real change. For example: pulling out of Iraq and Afghanistan, making a formal apology to the world, requesting international support for efforts toward reconciliation, and holding members of the Bush Administration accountable for wrongly driving the nation to war.
Thank you, and sincerely wanting of change that I can believe in,
Berd Whitlock
Today I finished reading The Richest Man in Babylon, by George Clason. Very interesting book, it is a fable, apparently based on some clay tablets, about the principles of gaining and controlling wealth (aka gold.) I have mixed emotions about the book. While it definitely delivers sound financial advice and principles, it leaves a lot to be desired when viewed from my perspective of concern about social and economic justice. I believe that hard work is important. Saving is important, and so is re-investment in socially responsible / life-serving activities. But the book has a decidedly "ends justify the means" approach to investing, that does not account for the present day realities of destructive technologies.
Although the ancient babylonians were (according to Clason's account) not a conquesting sort of people (and good for them!), they were not impervious to severe oppression, to dealing in slaves, and to amassing personal financial empires. I don't think that slavery can ever be rightly justified. No matter how much ambition, desire and determination a person has to succeed - it does not make it right to hold other human beings as property, to be ordered and subjugated in whatever way seems necessary or expedient toward amassing wealth. Dealing in human beings as a commodity is a very injurious and low-down way of economic operation.
This, of course doesn't absolve myself, (or anyone else) as an individual from working. It doesn't mean that as people we oughtn't take the initiative in order to provide for ourselves.
It's a new age. A new world. It is time for a new system of ethics. This is the Age of Aquarius. A new age. An age of humanitarian ethics. An age of innovation, invention, and tremendous opportunity - not to blindly pursue economic self-interest - but instead to pursue the common interests that we all share as part of the human family. This planet Earth is a beautiful and wonderful place. It is full of magic. We, as human beings, have important decisions to make about how we will choose to live in the future. Will we live in ways that are harmful to the planet and each other? Or will we live in ways that are beneficial, uplifting, and life-serving? 
I believe that we, as a society, can make a transition to a culture that does no harm. And not only that! I believe that we can have a society that actually serves to improve upon our environment, promoting bio-diversity, ensuring for all that there will be healthy water to drink, healthy air to breathe, healthy earth to grow food and play... This is not too much to ask. This is only the right path.
I Endorse the World MarchWorld March for Peace and Nonviolence
Because I am in agreement with:
1. nuclear disarmament at a global level;
2. the immediate withdrawal of invading troops from occupied territories
3. the progressive and proportional reduction of conventional weapons
4. the signing of non-aggression treaties between countries
5. the renunciation by governments of the use of war as a means to resolve conflicts
And furthermore, because I reject all forms of violence.
