When the New York Times published an Op Ed piece by Vladimir Putin on September 12th, 2013, they handed him the perfect bully pulpit. Let's put our hands together for freedom of the press.
A coup for the leader of Russia, he managed to stir up quite a brew of conversation amongst dueling pundits on TV news. I do recall thinking that the Op Ed piece was very American in its syntax and wondering what Russian employee of the former Soviet state had such linguistic savvy.
It turns out that this column came from the bowels of American culture; a PR firm in New York was paid 1.8 million dollars by the Russian state to handle its image in the US. And that sum was the firm's fee for less than a year's worth of work.
The world is upside down. The children of the proletariat revolution pay huge bucks to the children of capitalism to promote the children of the proletariat who are not longer the proletariat but still wear the garb of their forefathers. It just proves that money is still the green energy (as in greenbacks, better known as dollars - not environmentally friendly fuels) that drives the world; whichever horse has the most money on it wins in this rigged race.
Way back in the 1980's, a wise person told me that in the 21st century, one would not be able to believe what they see with their eyes or hear with their ears - that intuition/extraordinary insight would be only way to decipher the truth from the illusion. It seemed like an odd concept to me at the time, but then again that was before Photoshop and sophisticated software programs were able to alter reality with great realism.
In this geo-political chess game, I find myself in a unique position: the "don't know" frame of mind, one that is prized by Zen practitioners but is an interesting place to find myself - she who always has a decidedly emphatic position on everything.
Thus, today my practice is to practice; perhaps in between my thoughts, a fresh arising will clear the fog, at least for now.
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