May 17, 2001
Miscellaneous Subjects 83: 1. MAYDAY! MAYDAY! STOP THE GLOBAL PLAGUE!! + 2. Live webcast from the Prophets Conference on May 20 + 3. ISRAELI REPRESSION INTENSIFIES + 4. Fight back against the Bush/Cheney Energy Fiasco + 5. Foot-and-mouth 'probable' in U.S. + 6. Top Secret Electro Magnetic Weapons could be responsible for the destruction of the Murrah Building in Oklahoma, not Timothy McVeigh + 7. CHINESE GOVERNMENT ATTACKS U.S. WEB SITES + 8. EPA agrees dioxin poses cancer risk + 9. Personal history up for sale + 10. Danish Windmills + 11. The Master Violinist
Hello everyone
As usual I have a hard time keeping up with everything coming in, especially now with all the work to do in the garden.
Lots of important stuff in this one!...
Jean Hudon
Earth Rainbow Network Coordinator
http://www.cybernaute.com/earthconcert2000
Note: As I suspected the email about The Speech JFK Would Have Made, included in my last compilation has been determined to be a hoax.
1.
THIS IS ESPECIALLY IMPORTANT, PLEASE CIRCULATE AND HELP AS MUCH AS YOU CAN
Date: Mon, 14 May 2001
From: Betty Martini <Mission-Possible-USA@altavista.net>
Subject: MAYDAY! MAYDAY! STOP THE GLOBAL PLAGUE!!
INFORMANTS & WHISTLEBLOWERS NEEDED!
Little blue paks of rat poison sit on millions of dinner tables!
It's in children's vitamins and Kool Aid and it burns their brains out!
It triggers birth defects, abortions, infertility and sexual dysfunction.
It drops intelligence in children, occludes their ability to learn.
It damages DNA, cursing future generations.
It triggers brain tumors, Parkinson's, blindness, lupus and mimics MS.
It's the most complained about food additive in FDA history.
It's addictive! Its ASPARTAME/NUTRASWEET/EQUAL
This month a 1000 page medical text, ASPARTAME DISEASE, AN IGNORED EPIDEMIC, will be released by world famous H. J. Roberts, M.D.,FACP, FCCP once recognized as "the best doctor in the United States" by a national medical publication. F.R. Rifkin, Publisher of the National Health Review calls the text: "An enormous literary feat by a motivated doctor with impressive credentials. It constitutes a new text on medicine and pharmacology that should be required reading for every physician."
http://www.sunsentpress.com/ or 1 800 814-9800
Help Us:
Studies which sacrificed poor villagers in 6 South American countries saw brain tumors, seizures, damaged CNS and the hardening of synovial fluids. Some died. We have the translator's affidavit. We're trying to locate Dr. Art Chavarria who lives in Mexico City (from Belize) who claimed to have the studies, but when money was transferred he disappeared. He is said to work as a veterinarian for Agriculture, in feed and nutrition. Help us find actual victims or their families if they didn't survive, and the doctor who helped translate the studies who was from Mexico. This was in l983/84, studies by Searle.
Did you work for G. D. Searle Co, Monsanto/NutraSweet and have inside facts that can help us? We hear the National Soft Drink Association did a 10 year study on aspartame which showed it triggered Alzheimers, blindness and birth defects, but were not published. We need copies of this study and similar unpublished studies. We need to talk to employees who worked for Searle in the Ft. Lauderdale area before they closed the office in l984 after the studies were translated. We have also heard of teratogen studies that showed hearts on the outside of fetuses, not published.
The FDA once published a list of 92 reactions including death, as a summary of 10,000 consumer complaints. It triggers tumors, mental confusion, rage and imbalance, joint pain, drug interaction, vision and memory loss plus dozens of neurological reactions. The report is secret now and you can't get it without a congressman. Actual report is on http://www.dorway.com
The FDA sends out NutraSweet propaganda, it's like reporting crime to the Mafia. Does FDA mean Fatal Drugs Allowed? Why is this vital list that can save lives and protect us concealed and denied? Its criminal betrayal of an entire population in behalf of venal bureaucrats!
Two Federal attorneys were assigned to prosecute the manufacturer for fraud, but their lawyers hired the prosecutors and watched the case expire with the statute of limitations. When the godfather hires the district attorney nobody gets convicted. As it ravages the health, happiness and lives of millions, victims are reassured by FDA and the purveyors, to whom your welfare is meaningless.
Recall the 7 Dwarfs? The presidents of seven tobacco companies swore to Congress tobacco is safe. These men are their brothers! FDA, CDC, FAA, etc. tell us the Nutratanic is the safest ship afloat, maybe hoping they can switch sides and hire with the producers as have eleven federal officials already. Producers claim it's the "most tested product in history" but they paid for the rigged tests and never mention the 52 week study on seven infant monkeys: 5 had grand mal seizures, one died. You're the monkey now and its time to stop this atrocity. In some studies tumors were excised from rats, and the rats put back in the study. When they died some were resurrected on paper!
Government records like the FDA audit, Bressler Report, and protest of National Soft Drink Assn, and even the Board of Inquiry summation telling the FDA not to approve aspartame are on http://www.dorway.com
Books by physicians who know the truth are listed such as Excitotoxins: The Taste That Kills by Russell Blaylock, M.D. and other books by H. J. Roberts, M.D.
People are suffering all over the world and there are already four support groups on line.
Aspartame Toxicity Center http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartame
Insiders come forth, pro bono investigators, and investigative journalists. Remember when you damage DNA you can destroy a species. Please help us.
Betty Martini, Mission Possible International 770 242-2599.
2.
From: World Puja Events <events@worldpuja.com>
Date: 11 May 2001
Subject: Live webcast from the Prophets Conference
Dear WorldPuja Members
Please forward this email to your Peacemaker networks and join us on http://www.WorldPuja.org on Sunday, May 20, 2001 5:30pm (New York) LIVE WEBCAST FROM THE PROPHET'S CONFERENCE IN NEW YORK
Be part of an important experiment in global consciousness using the internet to make an atmospheric Peace Wave that transcends barriers of nationality, race and religion to unite humanity in a synchronized call for World Peace for all life on Earth. Global participants will join us live in New York via the internet in an audio webcast with CHAT - a true Global Interactive Forum.
You are invited to join the Prophet's Conference faculty and audience closing ceremony to participate in a LIVE WEBCAST LINK with a global audience for another worldwide Peace Wave on WorldPuja.org.
As a participant in this webcast YOU bring an important anchor to this Peace Wave - this webcast is part of a dataset measured by the Global Consciousness Project at Princeton University (http://www.noosphere.Princeton.edu) - an international effort involving researchers from several esteemed institutions and countries, designed to explore whether the construct of interconnected consciousness can be scientifically validated through objective measurement.
Please be there on http://www.WorldPuja.org on May 20th. And forward this email to your Peacemaker friends and family. Let's break internet records, once again.
Shine on THE WORLDPUJA TEAM
3.
From: "Action Center" <actioncenter@iacenter.org>
Subject: [IAC] ISRAELI REPRESSION INTENSIFIES
Date: Wed, 16 May 2001
International Action Center
39 West 14th St, #206
NY, NY 10011
212-633-6646
iacenter@iacenter.org
www.iacenter.org
ISRAELI REPRESSION INTENSIFIES AS AL-NAKBA ANNIVERSARY APPROACHES
By Richard Becker
May 14 was a day of unprecedented Israeli violence against the Palestinian people in the illegally occupied West Bank and Gaza.
Elements of the U.S.-armed Israeli Army, Navy and Air Force launched heavy assaults on residential areas and Palestinian Authority facilities in several areas. At least seven Palestinians were killed. Many more were seriously wounded.
Densely populated Gaza was rocketed from Navy gunboats, Air Force helicopters and by surface-to-surface Army missiles.
The heaviest death toll was in the West Bank town of Beitunia. There the Israeli Army, in a surprise attack, massacred five Palestinian security officers inside and outside their small checkpoint post.
Two of the Palestinian officers were reportedly sleeping and two others preparing food when the daytime attack took place. A sixth officer was seriously wounded.
PA President Yasir Arafat denounced the Israeli attack as "assassinations." He said, "Israel must know that it will be harshly judged over this crime."
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell refused to comment on the massacre of the Palestinians. Instead, Powell brazenly attacked Arafat, saying, "That kind of language I don't think is very helpful, especially during the time Israel is celebrating its anniversary."
May 15 was the 53rd anniversary of Israel's declaration of "independence." But the Palestinians commemorate the date as Al-Nakba, or "the Catastrophe," for when they were dispossessed and driven from their homeland.
Massive actions took place in the West Bank, Gaza, in Palestinian areas within the 1948 borders of the Israeli state and elsewhere.
Israeli soldiers firing live ammunition killed at least four Palestinians, and wounded more than 130 people, several of them critically. More than 30,000 marched in both Gaza and the West Bank, and tens of thousands more in Ramallah, Hebron (al-Khalil), Bethlehem and other cities. Many of the participants were refugees or their descendants, who have lived in impoverished camps for the past half-century. Many older participants in the Gaza protest waved the keys of their stolen homes.
CLIP
Contrary to the image deliberately created by U.S. officials and their official media, nearly all the fighting and dying goes on inside the tiny fraction of Palestine that is under tenuous Palestinian control. The relentless Israeli aggression is relentlessly termed "retaliation" by the corporate media.
Although it faces overwhelming fire-power and what appear to be insurmountable odds, the Palestinian resistance is intensifying and deepening. After all, the Palestinians have long confronted what appear to be impossible obstacles.
While they lack helicopters, gunboats, tanks, missiles and machine guns, the Palestinians are fighting back heroically with everything at their disposal. Tens of thousands reportedly marched militantly through Ramallah at the funeral of the five Palestinian security officers.
What the Palestinian people need in this critical hour is intensified international solidarity.
See also:
Palestinians Mark a Bitter Milestone Amid Violence
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/05/16/world/16MIDE.html
4.
Date: Sat, 12-May-2001
From: "Carolyn Johnson" <ccc@netone.com
Subject: Fight back against the Bush/Cheney Energy Fiasco
With the Bush Administration about to announce its MORE, MORE, MORE energy policy, we urge you to WRITE LETTERS ABOUT THE DEADLY TOLL FROM COAL TO THE EDITOR OF YOUR LOCAL PAPER. The Audubon article ought to give you plenty of ideas for your letter.
If you need more background to really get a great letter to the editortogether:
Environmental Groups Await Bush-Cheney Energy Plan A coalition of national environmental groups yesterday released more than 20 fact sheets to debunk energy myths ahead of the release of the Bush-Cheney energy plan. All of the fact sheets are at
http://www.ems.org/energy_policy/fact_sheets.html.
California Interfaith Power and Light, a statewide coalition of religious groups, launched a campaign this week to educate thousands of congregation members this summer about energy conservation and efficiency. Go to http://www.ems.org
Carolyn Johnson, Staff Director
Citizens Coal Council
"Clean Water, Safe Homes & a Healthy Environment"
1705 S. Pearl Street, #5
Denver, CO 80210
303-722-9119, fax: 303-722-8338
http://www.citizenscoalcouncil.org
5.
From: http://www.usatoday.com/news/washdc/2001-04-16-footandmouth.htm
Foot-and-mouth 'probable' in U.S.
(05/10/2001)
WASHINGTON Federal emergency officials are preparing for a U.S. outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease, a prospect they see as highly likely. About 75 federal officials from agencies ranging from the Agriculture Department to the CIA met Wednesday to review plans for addressing an outbreak of the highly infectious animal virus. The group also included officials from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Army's biological warfare office, the Coast Guard, the Interior Department and the Food and Drug Administration.
FEMA official Bruce Baughman said the plans call for treating an outbreak much the same as a natural disaster, in which states take primary responsibility and call on federal resources as needed. "We are certainly treating it like it's a probable likelihood," he said.
Others present at the meeting said the chances that the disease will spread to the United States were described as very high, fueling an intensive planning effort. Until now, the government has focused in its public statements on efforts to keep the disease from reaching the United States.
At last week's meeting, officials described arrangements for earth-moving equipment to bury thousands of animal carcasses, and the drafting of emergency orders that could suspend some environmental regulations to allow quick burial of afflicted livestock.
Inquiries about the government's assessment of the risk of a U.S. outbreak of the disease were referred to Cliff Oliver, who is heading emergency response plans for the Agriculture Department. Telephone calls to his home Monday night were unanswered.
Later, USDA spokesman Kevin Herglotz described the meeting as a standard planning session and said his department does not believe an outbreak is inevitable.
"I was in the military for 10 years. We did mock exercises every month. That didn't mean war was imminent," he said. Herglotz didn't attend the meeting but says he was briefed on it.
Foot-and-mouth disease affects pigs, cattle and other cloven-hoofed animals but is not generally harmful to humans.
The United States has not had a case of foot-and-mouth disease since 1929. In England, the current outbreak began in February and quickly spread.
Cases also have been confirmed in the Netherlands, France and Ireland. Recent outbreaks have occurred in Saudi Arabia, Argentina, South Korea and Taiwan.
The U.S. government has added hundreds of inspectors at airports and ports in an effort to keep the disease out, but the battle is made more difficult because of booming global travel and trade.
6.
From: "World-Action" <michaeli@globalnet.co.uk>
Subject: Top Secret Electro Magnetic Weapons could be responsible for the destruction of the Murrah Building in Oklahoma, not Timothy McVeigh
16 MAY 2001:
Today, mind-control victim, Timothy McVeigh would have died by state execution for a crime he was in no way responsible for. Mind-control victim, Timothy McVeigh has been given a 30 day stay of execution. It is extremely likely that a Star Wars platform 'took out' the Murrah Building in Oklahoma, USA, in April 1995.
"It is my contention that the OKC event was the result of a double-pronged EM weapon strike that caused the Earth's dielectric field to erupt up through the building. I, for one, think it's high time we found out the truth. Our lives, and quite possibly the future of our race, could depend upon it."
Harry Mason
From: http://www.nexusmagazine.com/bskies5.html
TOP-SECRET WEAPONS
By Harry Mason, B.Sc.,
M.Sc., Australia
Were Tesla-style EM weapons used in the Kobe earthquake, the Oklahoma City bombing and the downing of TWA Flight 800, in a secret war between unidentified factions?
CLIP
An eyewitness located in a car a couple of hundred metres from ground zero observed a silver-white light flash or beam coming out of the top of the building, followed by a large blue-white electrical arcing flash or beam, followed by an orange-red light flash or beam that shot out from the top of the building. These electrical and light effects took some five seconds and preceded the actual explosion.
CLIP
It is my contention that the OKC event was the result of a double -pronged EM weapon strike that caused the Earth's dielectric field to erupt up through the building.
The building shook first because of harmonic reaction to the first EM wave packet which also blew the building's electrical supply and created the various computer, digital compass and ionising hot-air effects.
Having rocked the building sufficiently, the EM weapon mode was advanced in a second strike to initiate atomic-bond rupture and literally blow the building material apart.
No conventional or nuclear explosive, including a so-called "A-Neutronic" bomb, can cause seismic shaking and electrical light-energy effects in a structure, seconds before the explosion blast-wave hits.
Oblique aerial photos of the Murrah Building show two nearly vertical, tubelike damage forms running through the building. These represent slightly displaced near-vertical but divergent beam-pulse orientations, suggesting an orbital platform was involved in the action.
Any bomb or militia-terrorist character to this event was set in train by those who hit the building, to ensure that the true nature of the weapon system and its technology was hidden from public and possibly other US Government personnel.
This implies that a faction from within the US Government was responsible.
Either that, or the US Government was warned well in advance that this particular building would be hit that day by an advanced weapon over which there was no defence-so it quickly found a patsy and built up a cover story.
"Need-to-know" secrecy policy suggests that there then entered a cock-up of horrific dimensions. Lower-level personnel had been searching for a bomb earlier that morning, having been told that the building was targeted for bombing by terrorists, but, in failing to find it, they then did not proceed to evacuate the building.
Higher government levels, having decided to hide the horrible truth from even their own operatives, had to have a plausible McVeigh militia-type event. The Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms personnel were better served, as were the Judges in the adjacent court house: they were all warned to stay away that day.
Secret Service personnel engaged in anti-drug operations were in their offices which lay in the centre of the damage and were wiped out by this OKC event. Interestingly, similar terrorist-bombing events in the past were apparently aimed at the same anti-drug Secret Service in both the downing of the Lockerbie Pan Am jumbo and the "bombing" of the New York World Trade Center. Indeed, it is possible that this entire series of events is being fought over a drugs empire.
More at http://www.nexusmagazine.com/bskies5.html
7.
Date: Mon, 14 May 2001
From: Trevor <wharmony@iinet.net.au>
Subject: CHINESE GOVERNMENT ATTACKS U.S. WEB SITES
Hi Jean,
Thought you might be interested in this report from Michael Williams in Switzerland.
Trevor
---
Greetings from Switzerland.
There is a major news story that is being covered here quite thoroughly, but it apparently is being totally ignored by the CIA-controlled USA media. Computer hackers employed by the Chinese government have apparently hacked into every single U.S. government web site, even including the White House web site, as well as hundreds of thousands of other U.S.-based web sites.
I have just received a message pertaining to this story from my correspondent, Marco Capelli on this subject. Here - read it for yourself:
Michael!
Do tell me you've already been getting news around you that chinese "anti-us-government" hackers have defaced multitudes of websites all over the US.
I know you don't like to get on the net very often just to see a URL, but this one should only take a couple secs. And take my word for it please, this one's so precious it'll be worthwhile for sure.
http://www.frucht.org
All my other sites seem intact, but they sprinkled
"Fuck USA Government" in bright red on a black background on my page.
If you want to see how many gazillions of pages they've disrupted, go to: http://www.attrition.org/mirror/attrition
and see which pages are identical to mine.
I know 12 personally, and have the impression it's in the high hundreds or low thousands already.
Thing is, friday they made their announcement of what ther were planning on doing, in true zapatista or henry david thoreau fashion saying monday they were going to get every computer in the US they could get their hands on.
Sure enough they did. Friday FOX news and MSNBC was mocking them. Acting like they couldn't possibly pull this off and arguing whether it was a hoax or not.
They were too confident, but alas, no press in the united states save for my fellow indymedia people and the 2600's and attritionorgs of the world are covering it at all!
Typical.
Marco
8.
From: DR_00@webtv.net (Dana Redding)
Date: Wed, 16 May 2001
Subject: EPA agrees dioxin poses cancer risk
WASHINGTON (AP) - A scientific advisory committee voted unanimously Tuesday to send a long-stalled report to federal regulators concluding that dioxin causes cancer in laboratory animals and possibly in people.
The conclusions - affecting everything from milk, beef and fish to medical products and the chemical and paper industries - puts another far-reaching environmental issue in the Bush administration's lap.
After more than a decade of study, the EPA committee findings could provide the basis for federal regulators to impose limits on dioxin that would be costly to the chemical, beef and poultry industries that have opposed them.
The committee split over whether to change wording in their draft report a year ago that said dioxin should be classified as a known human carcinogen.
``It is important that EPA continue to try to limit emissions and human exposure to this class of chemicals in view of their very long biological and environmental persistence,´´ the new version says.
Chlorinated dioxin is an air pollutant that comes from burning plastic and medical waste with chlorine. It settles in grass and feed, which is then eaten and becomes fat in livestock and poultry.
Dioxin also is a generic term for a group of compounds, some of which are more toxic than others.
The contaminant used in Agent Orange, a defoliant sprayed during the Vietnam War, includes the most toxic form of dioxin. Agent Orange exposure has been associated with cancer, birth defects and miscarriages, though a direct link to those health problems remains unproven. William Glaze, a University of North Carolina professor who chairs the advisory panel, called the report ``a huge step forward´´ toward possibly stricter controls. He said its key finding is that ``diet is the principal root of exposure´´ for people who consume even small amounts of dioxin in dairy products and fatty foods. ``We think that the agency should take action to continue to try to limit emissions of dioxin in the environment. How the agency chooses to do that is up to them,´´ Glaze said in an interview.
``This committee felt that regulating emissions is desirable.´´
He said his panel planned to send the report to EPA Administrator Christie Whitman by June 1. Whitman repeatedly has declined to comment on the report and how her agency intends to use it.
At the 17-member panel's meeting Tuesday, industry representatives questioned the science behind the report's conclusions.
``Despite thousands of studies, great uncertainty remains in our understanding of the effects of dioxin and dioxin-like compounds,´´ Marcie Francis, the science policy director of the Chlorine Chemistry Council, told Glaze´s panel.
Environmental groups were pleased the report is going forward.
``The fact that this report has been in draft form for the last 10 years has been a stumbling block for community groups and elected officials who have been working together to develop strong dioxin regulations,´´ said Monica Rohde, the dioxin campaign coordinator for the Center for Health, Environment and Justice.
The latest EPA dioxin study is the result of a series of official assessments and reassessments.
In 1985, the agency first looked at the health risks of dioxin and found it to be potentially one of the chemicals posing the greatest cancer threats to humans. But protests from the chemical industry led to another reassessment in 1991, from which the current draft report evolved.
On the Net:
EPA site: http://www.epa.gov/sab
CHEJ: http://www.chej.org
Chlorine council: http://www.ccc.com
9.
From: "Suzy Ward" <suzy@pacifier.com>
Subject: Personal history up for sale
Date: Thu, 10 May 2001
FYI and consideration for a compilation.
NewsMax.com Breaking News May 7, 2001
NewsMax.com readers know that we have reported on new federal rules and regulations that invade your privacy, specifically new rules that allow marketing companies to have access to your medical and financial data -- including your Social Security number.
Today, NewsMax.com's Wes Vernon reports that the banking industry is celebrating: few consumers are "opting out" of new federal rules that allow banks, credit card companies and other financial institutions to sell and share your private financial information, including your Social Security number.
The major media have ignored these important stories involving this invasion of your privacy. The banking industry and insurance companies want access to your medical and financial records -- and their lobbying efforts have paid off big time!
The media black out is why so few Americans know about the new rules that allow banks to share and sell your private financial data. Sen. Shelby has called the "opt out" program a "sham." It is. You may have recently gotten what looked like a piece of junk mail from your bank or credit card company. It may have been headlined something innocuous, like: "New Information Relating to Your Account." A lengthy legal treatise follows, typically with small print. Most people would have thrown this letter out with their junk mail. But by not reading this document and contacting your bank or credit card company, your financial institutions are now free to sell or share your Social Security number and your private financial data.
You can thank Bill Clinton and Congress for this new outrageous program and for the shoddy way consumers are informed. The law was created specifically to make it as difficult as possible to have you "opt out" to protect your financial records. If Congress was honest and represented you the people, they would have demanded that banks and credit card companies get your specific OK to sell and share your private financial information.
Please be sure to read more about this on NewsMax.com today: http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2001/5/6/211216.shtml
Also, NewsMax.com has widened its "Protect Privacy" petition to include protecting your Social Security number and financial data.
If you haven't signed this important petition, please do so and let Congress and Pres. Bush know how you feel: https://www.newsmaxstore.com/med_petition/index2.cfm
NewsMax.com has also launched an awareness campaign to alert millions of Americans about this invasion of privacy.
We have already run banner ads about this effort across the Web -- and sent out more than 100,000 direct mail letters to raise awareness. Only if more Americans are informed can the new, dangerous federal rules be stopped.
10.
Date: Wed, 09 May 2001
From: Peter Sorensen
Subject: Danish Windmills
Officials in Copenhagen, Denmark, helped to inaugurate the world's largest offshore windmill park this month. The park has a capacity of 40 megawatts of electricity -- four times more
than the second-largest offshore windmill park in Sweden -- and will supply about 3 percent of the city's energy, powering the equivalent of 32,000 homes. In total, more than 5,600 windmills produce about 10 percent of Denmark's electricity, selling at about 4 cents per kilowatt hour. Soeren Krohn of the windmill manufacturers association said wind power production in the country was expected to double by 2005.
More details: MSNBC.com, Associated Press, 05 May 2001
http://www.msnbc.com/news/569228.asp
11.
From: "Suzy Ward" <suzy@pacifier.com>
Subject: Fw: Food for Thought
Date: Sun, 13 May 2001
The Master Violinist
On Nov. 18, 1995, Itzhak Perlman, the violinist, came on stage to give a concert at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center in New York City. If you have ever been to a Perlman concert, you know that getting on stage is no small achievement for him. He was stricken with polio as a child, and so he has braces on both legs and walks with the aid of two crutches.
To see him walk across the stage one step at a time, painfully and slowly, is an unforgettable sight. He walks painfully, yet majestically, until he reaches his chair. Then he sits down, slowly, puts his crutches on the floor, undoes the clasps on his legs, tucks one foot back and extends the other foot forward. Then he bends down and picks up the violin, puts it under his chin, nods to the conductor and proceeds to play. By now, the audience is used to this ritual. They sit quietly while he makes his way across the stage to his chair. They remain reverently silent while he undoes the clasps on his legs.
They wait until he is ready to play.
But this time, something went wrong. Just as he finished the first few bars, one of the strings on his violin broke. You could hear it snap - it went off like gunfire across the room. There was no mistaking what that sound meant. There was no mistaking what he had to do. People who were there that night thought to themselves: "We figured that he would have to get up, put on the clasps again, pick up the crutches and limp his way off stage - to either find another violin or else find another string for this one."
But he didn't. Instead, he waited a moment, closed his eyes and then signaled the conductor to begin again. The orchestra began, and he played from where he had left off. And he played with such passion and such power and such purity as they had never heard before. Of course, anyone knows that it is impossible to play a symphonic work with just three strings. I know that, and you know that, but that night Itzhak Perlman refused to know that. You could see him modulating, changing, recomposing the piece in his head. At one point, it sounded like he was de-tuning the strings to get new sounds from them that they had never made before.
When he finished, there was an awesome silence in the room. And then people rose and cheered. There was an extraordinary outburst of applause from every corner of the auditorium. We were all on our feet, screaming and cheering, doing everything we could to show how much we appreciated what he had done.
He smiled, wiped the sweat from this brow, raised his bow to quiet us, and then he said, not boastfully, but in a quiet, pensive, reverent tone, "You know, sometimes it is the artist's task to find out how much music you can still make with what you have left."
What a powerful line that is. It has stayed in my mind ever since I heard it. And who knows? Perhaps that is the way of life - not just for artists, but for all of us. Here is a man who has prepared all his life to make music on a violin of four strings, who, all of a sudden, in the middle of a concert, finds himself with only three strings. So he makes music with three strings, and the music he made that night with just three strings was more beautiful, more sacred, more memorable, than any that he had ever made before, when he had four strings.
So, perhaps our task in this shaky, fast-changing, bewildering world in which we live is to make music, at first with all that we have, and then, when that is no longer possible, to make music with what we have left.
Written by Jack Riemer, Houston Chronicle
From: "Gerda Wout" <harmonia@interneeds.net>
"A human being is a part of a whole, called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest... a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty."
- Albert Einstein