Dumb and ignorant are not synonyms. Dumb, well, means dumb, but ignorant means uneducated. Dumb people will vote for Criminal Trump. Ignorant people may vote for Criminal Trump. Educated people, people who know the principles of democracy, will likely vote for Biden, not because he is brilliant, but because he is decent. Our nation was built on slavery and genocide. Blacks and the autochthonous were the victims. The progeny of slavery is racism. Racism permeates America. Criminal Trump, a vitriolic racist (redundant, but for good reason) himself, as was his father, will sell his rotten soul to garner four more years in the Oval Office rather than in a prison cell. Dumb, dumber, and dumbest, right? Criminal Trump wouldn't mind a little plagiarism, would he? He is functionally illiterate. Dumb as a rock. So we come full circle:  simply, there are more dumb people and uneducated people than reasonably intelligent people in America. But it doesn't take too much intelligence to mark a ballot or to wave the Stars and Stripes or to hate others whose skin is a slightly different shade than yours.

Copyright 2020 Tod Howard Hawks

You would do anything if I were your good little boy. You would
spend any amount of money if I were your good little boy. Nothing  
spared to make me your good little boy. A toy, a treat, whatever I
wanted if I were your good little boy. When I was 4 1/2, Mom had
her affair and you opened the door of the bedroom and saw your wife
naked in the arms of another man and it blew you away off the earth,
out of the solar system, out of the galaxy, and you never came back.
That's when I became your good little boy. You got your separate
bedroom, read books about famous men and'how to become rich.
Nothing from your wife, not a huge, not a kiss. Nothing but silence
in the night. That's when I became your good little boy. That's when
I learned to march to the beat of your drum. Even then, I knew uncon-
sciously my life depended on it. I did not get any unconditional love
from you, Dad, only a few crumbs of conditional approval, and only if
i were your good little boy. You used me vicariously for the only gratifi-
cation you could get. I was your only son, and Mom remained so depres-
sed all she could do was watch TV alone in the living room til 1 at night,
then go to her separate bedroom and read paperback detective stories til
3 a.m. As i grew up, the happiness I experienced was at school where I
had friends, many friends, not at home. I loved the house I lived in, but
felt sorry for it;  I was projecting my own deep sadness on to it. I made
straight A's through school, but that just came naturally. One time--I
mean ONE time--Dad played catch with me in the front yard. The
apex of his wishes for me was to attend Andover. When I did, Dad,
of course, went with me. He met the Headmaster and saw what kind
of shoes he was wearing, shoes that you would never see in Topeka,
Kansas, so Dad went out and bought for me the same kind of shoes
the Headmaster had been wearing. How sick was that, I thought!
It wasn't until I dropped out of law school that I first defied my father.
That was when I stopped being his good little boy and began living
my own life. It was also when Dad disowned me emotionally for the
rest of his life.

Copyright 2020 Tod Howard Hawks

shoes the Headmaster

18.4 K Words. What is the significance of this statistic? So many politicians are prolix and say nothing, except to misinform. or even worse, to lie. Those who are wise are laconic:  truth is expressed in but few words. Literary agents in Manhattan want to know how many words are in your mannuscript, but want to receive only several pages of it to read. This tells me their foremost concern is making money, not discovering literary merit. Often silence is the most articulate.

Copyright 2020 Tod Howard Hawks

I do not underestimate mysellf. More importantly, I do not underestimate the poor of Earth. They have been enslaved, abused, scorned, starved, left homeless and uneducated to this very day. Yet they persevere. Notwithstanding, they bring new life into this world, their babies, their children. Each is sacred. Their divine worth is inviolate. But those who currently rule the world are impervious to their suffering and are unaware of the great, fatal, inevitable result they will encounter because of their moral blindness. There will be, sooner than later, an uprising of the poor of Earth. There will be no guns, no bombs, no killings, no wars, because this ascendancy is spiritually preordained. And the poor will no longer be poor. They will share equally with all others the good of Earth. And this horror of millennia will come to an end. It is already beginning to happen as I write. Rejoice!

TOD HOWARD HAWKS

PEACE ON EARTH THROUGH LOVE

Turning the World Right-Side In

by

Tod Howard Hawks


PREAMBLE: All we have is our little planet, Earth. For the vast majority of my life, I have thought, “What would it be like to have Peace on Earth?” But for only two, maybe three, weeks every year, usually around Christmas, I would see the phrase “Peace on Earth.” But after Christmas, I would not hear or see that sanguine notion for 11 more months. The longer I lived, the more this annual ritual bothered me. At Andover, I had studied European history. At Columbia, I had majored in American history. Over time, I increasingly came to the realization that in both prep school and college, I had essentially been studying about wars on top of wars and their aftermaths: millions and millions and millions of human beings being killed. Then, when I got curious, I used my computer to find out that, according to many scholars, only a little over 200, out of roughly 3,400 years of recorded history, were deemed “peaceful.” Humanity, I concluded, had a horrible track record when it came to effectuating “Peace on Earth.” And during my lifetime things have not gotten any better.

SPIRITUAL ECOLOGY: There is one land, one sky, one sea, one people. The boundaries that divide us are not on maps, but in our minds and hearts. John Donne was prescient. Earth is as impoverished as its poorest Citizen, as healthy as her sickest, as educated as her most ignorant. If we pollute the upper waters of the Mississippi, then ineluctably we shall pollute the Indian Ocean. If we continue to pollute our air, the current 7,500,000,000 Citizens on Earth will die. The pandemic does not care at all about national boundaries. All species will be accorded the same concern and care as Citizens. The imminent threats of nuclear holocaust and catastrophic climate change we need urgently to prevent. This is the truth of Spiritual Ecology.

CAMPAIGN FOR EARTH: If we can wage war, why should we not wage peace? Nations are anachronistic; therefore, there will be none. There will only be Earth and Citizens of Earth. Each Citizen will devote a sizable number of years of her/his life to the betterment of humankind and Earth. All military weapons — from handguns to hydrogen bombs — will be destroyed, and any future weapons will be prohibited. All jails and prisons will be closed, replaced by Love Centers (see below). Automation and other technological advances will enhance the opportunity for all Citizens exponentially to realize their potential, personally and spiritually. There will be no money. All precious resources and assets of Earth will be distributed equally among all Citizens. The only things Citizens will own are the right to be treated well and the responsibility to treat Earth and all its Citizens well. All Citizens will be free to travel anywhere, at any time, on Earth. All satisfying life, including the best education, health care, housing, food, and other necessities throughout Earth.

LOVE: The only way to change anything for the good, for good, is through love. Love is what every living creation on Earth needs. Love Centers are for those Citizens who were not loved enough, or at all, especially at their earliest of ages. Concomitantly, they act out their pain hurtfully, sometimes lethally, often against other Citizens. Citizens who are emotionally ill will be separated from those who are not. Jails and prisons only abet this deleterious situation. Some Citizens in pain may need to be constrained in Love Centers humanely while they recover, through being loved, so they do not hurt themselves or others. In some extreme cases, Citizens may be in so much pain that they remain violent for a long time. Thus, they may need to be constrained for the rest of their lives, but always loved, never punished. In time, Citizens, when loved enough, will only have love to give, and the need for Love Centers will commensurately decline.

EARTH: In 1948, Eleanor Roosevelt chaired the commission that wrote the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. UDHR, with some updates and revisions, will serve as the moral and legal guidepost for Earth.

GENERAL ASSEMBLY: To honor and remember the former nations on Earth, one member will be elected by Citizens from each of these former nations to serve a one five-year term as a member of the General Assembly. In succeeding elections, Citizens currently residing at that time in areas that were formerly nations, will again, in perpetuity, vote for one Citizen also residing in that area, for a one five-year term as a member of the General Assembly.

FIRST VOTE: The first vote of all Citizens will be to establish CAMPAIGN FOR EARTH. Majority rules. All Citizens will have access to Internet voting, as well as access to cell phones and other types of computers. Citizens will have her/his own secured ID codes. Citizens will have to be 18 or older to vote. Citizens will be encouraged to bring before the General Assembly all ideas and recommendations, as well as any concerns or complaints, which will be considered and responded to promptly. Citizens’ ideas and recommendations will be formed into proposals drafted by members of the General Assembly. Citizens will vote on these proposals of each month during the days of the following month. Citizens of Earth will be Earth’s government. Members of the General Assembly will be facilitators who will work with millions of volunteers. There will be no president of Earth.

ALLCOTT MOVEMENT: If the multinational corporations that now rule Earth do not abide by the outcome of a majority vote in favor of CAMPAIGN FOR EARTH, Citizens of Earth will instigate the Allcott Movement, a one-at-a-time mancott, womancott, girlcott, boycott — hence, Allcott — against each multinational corporation unwilling to relinquish control of its global business and give it, and all its assets, to Citizens of Earth. Citizens will continue the Allcott Movement until all multinational corporations have done the same. All personal and smaller-business wealth will be converted into resources to be distributed equally to all Citizens. All proceeds in excess of what’s needed reasonably by each Citizen will be saved for future generations. No violence of any kind will occur during the transfer of these resources. Citizens will take these steps because they are the moral, the right, steps to take to save all living creations on Earth, and Earth itself.

PEACE ON EARTH, FOREVER: Wealth is not worth. The mansuetude of loving, and being loved, is. When love is your currency, all else is counterfeit. Citizens will be able to go about creating their own happiness that is built on love-based personal relationships and professional activities. No longer will human beings be able to profit from another’s pain. Indeed, profit will never be seen on Earth again. With love at the center of being and living, there will be no more wars, no more dictators, no more corruption. Finally, there will only be Peace on Earth, forever.

Copyright 2020 Tod Howard Hawks

A graduate of Phillips Andover Academy and Columbia College, Columbia University, Tod Howard Hawks has been a poet and a human-rights advocate his entire adult life.

todhawks@gmail.com

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You weren't sure when you knew it. You weren't sure where it came from. But sooner than later it enveloped you. It was your calling. No words, nothing written. Just a sense, a feeling that permeated your being. And finally you knew. No ambiguities, no uncertainties, no ambivalences. Just truth. It was intuition. No manuals, no table of contents. No advanced degrees required. It was your life, the rest of your life. It was the reason you were born. It was the reason you were on Earth. It was your destiny. There is nothing more to say except to follow it, your calling.

TOD HOWARD HAWKS

Truth is the ne plus ultra.

Copyright 2020 Tod Howard Hawks