St Matthew Passion – H Rilling: Können Tränen meiner Wangen nichts erlangen
Aria Alto
Violino I/II, Continuo
Können Tränen meiner Wangen
If the tears on my cheeks can
Nichts erlangen,
Achieve nothing,
O, so nehmt mein Herz hinein!
O then take my heart!
Aber lasst es bei den Fluten,
But let it for the streams,
Wenn die Wunden milde bluten,
As the wounds gently bleed
Auch die Opferschale sein!
Also be the sacrificial cup!
Paul Krugman, a professor at Princeton and a Nobel Laureate, is specialised on international trade and finance. His current work is focused on economic and currency crises, and he is one of the preeminent economists of our time. I am inclined to trust his verdict.
He calls the GOP budget plan voodoo economics.
“A plan that proposes to cut spending to Calving Coolidge levels, without explaining how it will do that; that includes $2.9 trillion in tax cuts, but asserts that it will make that up by broadening the base — yet says literally nothing about what that means; and has as its centerpiece a Medicare plan that will collapse as soon as seniors start getting their grossly inadequate vouchers.”
I am not an economist, but I’d say he has a point.
The European Union has just granted an € 90 bn bailout to Portugal. A tiny country at the edge of the continent, a tiny strip at the Atlantic coast with a level of debt about 230% of it’s GDP and the lowest economic growth in Europe. At least, they do not owe the crisis to the reckless gambling habits of their banking system, but they had since seen their credit ratings downgraded to dangerous levels. At the same time as austerity plans are imposed on European countries, the European Central Bank raises the interest rate.
And how is this supposed to stimulate the economy ?
Many commentators swooned earlier this week after House Republicans, led by the Budget Committee chairman, Paul Ryan, unveiled their budget proposals. They lavished praise on Mr. Ryan, asserting that his plan set a new standard of fiscal seriousness.
Well, they should have waited until people who know how to read budget numbers had a chance to study the proposal. For the G.O.P. plan turns out not to be serious at all. Instead, it’s simultaneously ridiculous and heartless.
How ridiculous is it? Let me count the ways — or rather a few of the ways, because there are more howlers in the plan than I can cover in one column.
PLEASE STAY WITH ME
By Justme
Please stay with me
Just a little while
The breath is fading
Closing is the night
And the skin above my eyes
Are like the sails filled with gusty might
I fight the sailors of time
As they pull my sails down
To block out the light
Stay with me.
Just a little while
Place your imagined hand in mine
That I may remember and feel once more
The bumps and dips of time
and feel your warmth
Although it was but a moment ago
Still I forget
Stay with me
just a little while
put your hand against my face
cup your hand with my shallow cheek
The perfect fit, no space
I hear no clock of time
Keep it covered
Lest the tick drives my mind
Stay with me
Just a little while
Talk with me, as
My lips grow heavy
My breath falls light
Place your head near mine
That I may feel your tears
That your breath may dance and tickle my skin
One more time.
Please, one more time.
Stay with me
Just a little while
Kiss my head that I may feel
And smell your love.
The last light has gone
Now.
I am done.
Please remember me.
The sailors are victorious.
The lids of life no more.
By Joseph E. Stiglitz
The consequences of the Japanese earthquake – especially the ongoing crisis at the Fukushima nuclear power plant – resonate grimly for observers of the American financial crash that precipitated the Great Recession. Both events provide stark lessons about risks, and about how badly markets and societies can manage them.
Of course, in one sense, there is no comparison between the tragedy of the earthquake – which has left more than 25,000 people dead or missing – and the financial crisis, to which no such acute physical suffering can be attributed. But when it comes to the nuclear meltdown at Fukushima, there is a common theme in the two events.
Experts in both the nuclear and finance industries assured us that new technology had all but eliminated the risk of catastrophe. Events proved them wrong: not only did the risks exist, but their consequences were so enormous that they easily erased all the supposed benefits of the systems that industry leaders promoted.
Do you pay regular visits to yourself?
Don’t argue or answer rationally.
Let us die, and dying, reply. ≈Rumi
Reconnecting with the body ( Eckhart Tolle)
Tara Bach: Living from Presence : How to relax into awareness
Source: http://www.tarabach.com
“Connecting to the Source” is the central spiritual practice in order to align oneself with the higher self and the greater power of the universe. For some this comes natural, others need some time to experience the flow of life.
How are you doing it ? Where do you feel it and which practice do you consider useful in to tune into the energy system of the body ?
Your comments are welcome !
The Living Room 
