Three times, Megan and I swam with dolphins. Twice, it was at a place in Key Largo called Dolphins Plus. The third time was on the island of Margarita, off the coast of Venezuela. Each experience was unique, magnificent, and in a strange way, even spiritual. I felt I was in contact with a consciousness so far beyond anything humans can even imagine that it took me years to process the experiences.
I had read John Lilly’s books about interspecies communication with dolphins. Lilly was a medical doctor who lived in an isolation tank with dolphins in the Virgin Islands and claimed he could communicate with them. He experimented with hallucinogenics – LSD was his drug of choice – while living in that tank. I had read other books on dolphin/human communication and of miraculous healings that took place when people swam with these splendid creatures. But none of these books prepared me for the actual experience. As a result of those experiences, I wrote a novel called Vanished, which isn’t in print anymore, about how dolphins, whales and other species rebelled against human incursion and travesties in the oceans.
So it was deeply troubling to run across an article this evening on the Huffington Post about how dolphins have fared during this oil gusher in the gulf. It’s a roundup from various news sources. From the NY Daily News: “There is a lot of coverup for BP. They specifically informed us that they don’t want these pictures of the dead animals. They know the ocean will wipe away most of the evidence. It’s important to me that people know the truth about what’s going on here,” one contractor said. “The things I’ve seen: They just aren’t right. All the life out here is just full of oil. I’m going to show you what BP never showed the President.”
This dolphin carcass was found on Queen Bess Island in the gulf. The BP contract worker who took a NY Daily News Reporter to this area, said, “When we found this dolphin, it was filled with oil. Oil was just pouring out of it. It was the saddest darn thing to look at.”
We can struggle to imagine a clean gulf, where life flourishes. We can try, collectively, to envision a world where this sort of thing doesn’t happen because we have alternative energy sources. We can employ the techniques that Abraham – aka Esther and Jerry Hicks – suggest about seeing it from within the vortex. We can even use some Seth stuff here (Jane Roberts) and say that free will prevails on all counts – that the dolphin chose to be sacrificed on the altar of big oil to drive home a point. But does any of that mitigate the horror and sadness I feel when I read about a dolphin filled with oil?
Not really. Today, federal regulators granted a new drilling permit to Bandon Oil and Gas for a well that will be 115 feet deep – a shallow well. – 50 miles off the coast of Louisiana. According to the article cited above, “Obama quietly allowed a three-week old ban on drilling in shallow water to expire.”
I voted for Obama in 2008. I believed in his message of change. But he has flipped on so many major issues that he won’t win my vote again. It’s not like I’ll vote Republican (not in this life) and it’s not as if Obama will miss my vote.
But a vote is my contribution to a democracy – that is beginning to look more and more like that a corporate game. When the supreme court recognizes corporations as individuals, you know you’re in deep trouble. There’s a standing joke – a very dark joke – among some progressives that when people like Obama make it into the White House, they’re shown the Magruder film of the Kennedy assassination and are told to tow the line or else. So they flip flop. Conspiratorial? Maybe. But suppose it’s true?
And yes, as the NY Times reports, there’s some serious talk about nuking the gusher.
Here’s what author and radio guy Thomas Hartmann has to say about it:
PS I was angry when I wrote this and know I probably will vote for Obama in 2012 because I simply won’t vote Republican. If there’s an independent party candidate, however, who’s a progressive and – dare I use the word? – genuine, then all bets are off.
– Trish
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and did anyone see the female president of some council in new orleans get on national tv and advocate for continued offshore drilling yesterday??? with a straight face, even!!!
A whole bunch of these comments came in after we lost internet service – and TV and phones. Have to go thru them carefully.
I have been reading all your posts and comments about the oil spill horror but not commenting myself. I agree with everyone and find all this so distressing that I cannot watch the news about it any more because I stop functioning. Was it T.S. Elliot who said, "The world will end, not with a bang but a whimper." Well we are in a big horror of a whimper.
I did want to comment about John Lilly. I read his book years ago, "The Center of the Cyclone." Was that the one where he told about his dolphin experiences? I have carted hundreds of books back and forth across the country and during my recent move just over a year ago, I could not afford to do this any more and had to give most of my books away. John Lilly's book was one that I wish I had now. Perhaps just as well since I can't keep up with my ToDo list these days.
I remember the part where Lilly told about his relationship with a special female dolphin. At some point he felt guilty about keeping the dolphins in confinement and decided to let them go free. When he did, his special dolphin friend committed suicide in sadness.
Thinking about John Lilly caused me to remember a little dream synchronicity I had about him. It was in the early 1970's. One of his his books had just come out and he was doing a lecture tour. I attended one of his talks at Wainwright House in Rye New York. I had no idea what John Lilly looked like and had not yet read his book. The night before the lecture I dreamed I went to the lecture, saw him and noted that he was wearing a jumpsuit instead of the usual suit or sport's coat of the time. I thought that very odd. Only auto mechanics wore jumpsuits. And I tried to figure out the symbolism of the jumpsuit.
When I got to the lecture, Lilly looked just like he did in the dream and he was wearing a jumpsuit. I've never seen a man, before or since, who wore a jumpsuit as his clothing of choice. I'd like to find that dream to see what other points there may have been to it.
Adele
Mike – you make so many valid points. We'll respond at greater length when we get our internet coinneciton fixed! Am using a neighbor's computer right now.
Trish and Rob: In answer to your question Obama is getting bad press beacuse there is a feeling that he is very anti-British, this isn't just because of the oil. It's historical – he alleges, for example, that his grandfather was tortured by British authorities during the 50s Mau Mau rebellion in Kenya. He hasn't shown the warmth for Britain which Reagan, Clinton, Bush and his father had.
I see that someone wrote above that they hope BP go bankrupt. I hope they don't! There are always other aspects to disasters. BP is one of the largest British companies which means most UK occupational pensions and insurance companies have money invested in their shares. Already billions have been knocked off their share price.
If they should go bankrupt (as some people seem to hope) it will have a severe knock on effect for many average workers in the UK and their pension funds.
BP is also one of the UK's biggest taxpayers, often as much as £10 billion in a year – that's about US$16 billion. This would be a large hole to fill.
I can fully understand the BP backlash in the USA – it's just horrific as to what happened and is still happening to the environment. BP has a serious case to answer and extensive reparations to make. No one would argue with that.
However, when the Exxon Valdez oil tanker sank off Alaska it's US owners weren't treated as criminals. When the North Sea oil rig Piper Alpha exploded in 1988 at the cost of 167 lives, the British did not inveigh against it's American owners.
Think I'd better leave it there! I just pray that there will be some good news soon.
Mike.
Democrat and Republican politicians are two sides of the same coin. Their speeches may not be the same and their methods different, but they are still both working for Wall St. and big corporations. Like it or not, the government is ruled by the elite, for the elite. Changing that would be difficult. Even if one person were elected who was not in the service of big corporations, that would still only be one person among many elected officials in the US government.
Obama is just an orator and media darling. I think there are others pulling his strings.
My very first thought when I heard about the oil spill was what is going to happen to the dolphins. Would they leave the Gulf, those that weren't trapped?
I heard on MSNBC that at one private airport planes could not get clearance to take off once the passenger manifest listed reporters known to BP. The same report talked about thugs hired by BP were keeping witnesses off the beaches. Some of these thugs were law enforcement officers in the pockets of BP.
Florida is one of the most environmentally conscious states in the nation. When I was on a ship at Cape Canaveral docked at a commercial pier the treated sewage had to be as pure as drinking water before it could be off loaded into the pier side sewage pipes. I was there when the state inspector took samples.
It is especially sad to sea BP foul the waters of a state that is so careful of the marine environment.
BP should lose its charter to do business in the US or anywhere within the 200 mile limit offshore.
Ray
It's 11:55 PM in Central, my time,and I'd just read all previous comments. I was ready to state my own and the WordVerify was : block. Not Kidding!
Then I realized I had to sign in and the wv now is: patinic
Draw your own conclusions!
Anyway, I just wanted to drop a few ideas based on convo with friend tonight.
1) If Prez was serious about the crisis then why didn't he go to Houston where 1000 engineers were gathered and start walking the aisles and make it clear that this was a National Emergency?
And stay there and watch each new development come in?
2) Why has BP controlled the pics and video coming in? Where are some 'independent' divers and cameras?
3) Isn't now the time to exhort our USA population to stop buying bottles of water (petroleum-based), cut back on gasoline consumption, turn up the thermostat and use fans?
I'm prob'ly too much influenced by watching the History Channel and learning about all the personal sacrifices that the US population did during World War Two. I wonder: Could this nation do it again?
When have we ever been asked to do specific acts to affect our lifestyles and the consumption rates of our country?
Enough for now. The WV (again)is "patinic". (panic? no panic?)
Is the internet the physical manifestation of telepathy?
If my cable drops off tomorrow,do we all still stay in touch?
Hmmmm…..What would the colony at Cassadaga say??
Love this site, y'all.
Mike – just curious. Is O getting bad press in the UK because of this oil mess?
I like connie's suggestion, too. Thanks for the link, Debra. Off to check that out!
"The Obama administration is blocking all new offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, a day after regulators approved a new permit for drilling in shallow water."
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/03/gulf-oil-spill-feds-halt-_n_599491.html
oh, and connie – for sure on the obama intent! i'm all for that!
over the years, i've boycotted so many corp entities, my kids keep reminding me that i'll soon have nowhere to shop or eat or buy gas or whatever – and i know that my little $$$ will not be missed by them but at the same time i know that i've done what i could do –
and i agree about the political complacency issue – and i've carried my share of protest signs in washington – time again, it seems!
"Coast Guard pollution investigators were responding to reports of an oily substance and tar balls near Duck Key, Fla., Long Key, Fla., and Grassy Key, Fla. "
🙁
https://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37463005/ns/disaster_in_the_gulf/
You're undoubtedly right, Sansego. We stopped buying BP. I hope the suckers go bankrupt, @ the very least, and that someone goes to jail.
D – I can just envision your daughter and the dolphin!
I knew when I voted for Obama that there's no way our corporate structure will allow him or any other president to make good on liberal promises. That's not how our government operates. I really believe that the JFK assassination was because JFK refused to commit U.S. troops in Vietnam…and that every president who comes into office is given a veiled threat that they face the same fate as JFK if they go against the wishes of the Military Industrial Complex.
Obama is a smart man. He wants to walk out of the White House in January 2017 as a "successful" two-term president, not be this generation's JFK-MLK.
We the people should take FDR's words to heart. He told his supporters that they had to use their numbers to DEMAND that changes need to be made. Liberals have a problem with being complacent. We rolled over and let the Brooks Brothers protestors intimidate vote counters in Florida 2000. The only people out protesting are the Teabaggers. Why aren't liberals out their protesting corporations and BP oil execs? We need to be out there in large numbers, protesting and demanding that our corporate capitalist system be dismantled in favour of an "ethiconomy". At a minimum, people should stop buying gasoline from BP. They need to be bankrupted and put out of business.
Not voting for Obama in 2012? Palin or Romney would love to hear that! He hasn't lost my vote, though his response has been disappointing. After the Clinton administration, liberals should have learned that the deck is stacked against our country having a true progressive president any time soon. Hillary Clinton was the establishment's choice, but when it was clear that Obama was the people's choice, corporations soon supported his campaign. We saw "evidence" that some kind of deal was made when Obama chose Wall Street execs to head the Treasury Department. Foxes guarding the hen house!
The best thing we can do to help Obama is by putting pressure on corporations through boycotts and protests. A part of me admires the gumption of the French during their 1789 revolution. The people put some real fear into the corrupt government ministers by use of the guillotine. This is one reason why I support the death penalty. If a person abuses their power, which affects the lives of hundreds of thousands or millions of people, death is the only just punishment. It serves as a good deterrent for the next politician to be more mindful of the will of the people.
I believe that dolphins are conscious and highly intelligent. The moment the gulf disaster was announce, I grieved for them, an all other species as. My tiny daughter Laryssa (whom Rob & Trish have posted a few stories about) was allowed private access to Seaworld before they opened one morning. She and a dolphin named Beaker (who was born with a birth defect as well) had an instant bond. He came up the side the pool so she could touch him. She had her hand on his head. It was very sweet. There was no doubt in my mind that they were "communicating". He didn't want us to leave the pool. We have photos of him watching us through the glass as we walked away.
This disaster had made me so sad, that I'm can hardly cope w/ it.
As for Obama and the oil thing, I am disappointed as well. My small dealing with politics (2 + 1/2 yrs on an Homeowner's Association) has shown be that elected positions are puppets. The laws, and corporations, tell us what to do. We have no power against state and local legislature. Also the property management and contractors will do what they want, no matter what the HOA board decrees, making our HOA board positions useless. They are part of a large "good ole boy" network. I assume that it is the same for larger political positions all the way up to Capitol Hill.
"When we found this dolphin, it was filled with oil." I think this hit me harder than anything I have read for a long time. It's beyond words.
I don't know too much about US politics so won't comment other than to say that Obama is not getting good press here in the UK. Surely this is the man who proposed opening up 167 million acres to offshore exploration only three weeks before the Deepwater Horizon explosion.
P.S. I wonder what might happen if all of us, with true spiritual intent and powerful focus, sent a Surround of the brightest Light we can conceive and wrap it around our President? Might help. Couldn't hurt. Just a thought. cjc
I admit to being somewhat of a "conspiracy theorist". Regarding elections, I always vote person and not party, being guided by intuition. I absolutely agree with all that is being said here. At this point in Time, it makes no difference who is in the Oval Office. Thus, my earlier comments about who is pulling Obama's puppet strings. I have a firm conviction that there does indeed exist a "shadow government", by whatever name one wishes to call that more or less hidden organization that quite literally functions as the machine running this planet's events, political and possibly otherwise. Whoever holds the office of the American President may, willingly or unwillingly, knowingly (BushCo X 2), or unknowingly, is at the mercy of the shadow gov't holding the power. In effect, the President has little power himself, (or herself, as the case may someday be). BIG BROTHER is actually BIG BUSINESS, and it is those who have the billions of $ who dictate the rules…or as we say in medical, the POLICY AND PROTOCOL. There has been one President, as a certainty, who bucked their system and refused to follow their rules, and he was assassinated. Personally, I don't believe most of the leaders know who the TRUE powers are, and they genuinely believe they are in charge and have power, but like Obama, they are not in charge and do not have power. So no, we cannot lay full blame on him, as much as we need a scapegoat. For all we know, he may be operating completely in the dark, (as in not aware), making decisions based on info he is being given and that he accepts as truth because he trusts those advisors, who are getting THEIR orders from the Shadow Gov't. I don't think we can make this a political issue as in Dem or Rep, Obama or McCain, etc. I don't think party affiliation makes any diference. The chess board has long been in place, as have the chess pieces, and the pieces are being moved around at will by invisible Players controlling the board. (Our planet.) Who can change this? I fear no one can. We must simply keep moving forward as best we can and try to visualize and materialize solutions, which may or may not manifest because we're up against forces beyond our ken. cjc
just now reading your last comments – obviously citibankboy was right – deep sigh –
i'm with DJ on my exposure to the latest happenings through these great posts of yours, trish and rob – it is much less traumatic for my own psyche – my gratitude to you – i, too, am more deeply moved than i can even verbalize by this post – and the entire situation – in terms of these dear cousin creatures and their place here with us who are destroying them, my heart cries! and i, too, am disappointed in our president – very – however, while i do not defend or condone his actions and/or acts of omission regarding this incident [and others], i do not discount/negate my own intuition about his innate character by now perceiving him to be a dark spirit [although misinformed, misguided or mis-whatever] – and as rob suggests of the dark joke, suppose it IS true? how might each of us react in that situation? and should we dare ask what might bush have done?
ok, enough of my own politicizing –
great post, as usual, trish and rob!!!
If McCain was prez, I'm sure he would also approve of new wells in the Gulf, and we'd be saying, "Oh, if only Obama had been elected. He wouldn't do that. He would stop this."
Wrong. The winner of the election was big business. The deck was stacked.
I remember talking to a Citibank exec before the election, a wealthy man who lives on the ocean, enjoys fast boats, airplanes and big game hunting in Africa–the latter the topic of his novel that he wanted me to read.
I asked him what he thought would happen if Obama won. Instead of giving the Tea Party type response that I expected, he answered matter-of-factly: "It doesn't really matter who wins. He'll do what the corporations want. That's the way it works."
Rob
Glad your out of the hospital, and feeling feisty, tho upset.
Question: What would McCain and Palin have done…been doing differently????
It's oil, baby. Big money talks, and right now the oil corporations are fueling the GOP.
Glad your out of the hospital, and feeling feisty, tho upset.
Question: What would McCain and Palin have done…been doing differently????
It's oil, baby. Big money talks, and right now the oil corporations are fueling the GOP.
I am so disappointed in Obama. I agree with you, he won't receive my vote again.
I was out of touch yesterday because I spent the day in the emergency room at St. Luke's Hospital with a serious cardiac issue and was admitted for overnight observation.
Am OK now…for now. When I caught up with the news on Comcast this morning and saw that Obama has "quietly" signed the release for new, shallow wells to be drilled in the Gulf, I was…can't even describe what I feel. For anyone who supports this Commander-in-Chief, I apologize, but he either needs a thorough brain work-up or he needs to be impeached out of office. My disappointment in him has turned into a deep-seated fear that he is a Destroyer who is ultimately going to bering this country and everything we consider precious and of value, down beyond repair. No, he isn't the only one. But as he said in his famous little speech about the oil spill last week, "THE BUCK STOPS WITH ME!" Yessir, it surely does! And then you reverse your promises and give permission for NEW WELLs in the Gulf??? These are the actions of an insane man, or one with an agenda that is unthinkable. I look at the photos of the dying and already dead animals….an innocent dolphin, sacred among creatures, the oil-soaked pelicans, beaks and feathers black with the toxin, the tiny crabs scurrying onto the sand trying to breathe and survive, the choked breeding grounds killed by tides of oil, all…all of this and too much more to contemplate…. sacrificed in the name of greed, and I sit here and literally weep. NEW WELLS? And now my own state, and Trish's and Rob's, is in the line of fire of the oil. It is just 7 miles off Pensacola and beginning to come onshore there on those pristine white beaches. One of our senators spoke last night, with valid, updated descriptions, of how the oil will be blown down our West Coast, through the Keys, be caught by the Loop Current, and come up our East Coast. The wildlife here is exactly like it is along Texas, LA, Miss, and Alabama. Millions upon millions of species of creatures and plants, and an entire culture is being murdered F O R E V E R. What a dastardly act, Mr. President! What CAN you be thinking?? And WHO…WHO…is pulling your puppet strings?? I am beyond words. As a profound planetary empath, is it any wonder that my vulnerable human heart is in serious trouble? cjc
Anyone who doesn't think this oil disaster is a huge game changer is wrong. I can barely stand to watch the news these days, and I make myself read your posts because I believe it's a safer way to hear about these things. But right now I am heartsick. If I don't comment much it doesn't mean I'm not reading, but I've GOT to concentrate on the positive these days to keep my own head above water.