YOUR NAME HERE! Rainbow Spiral Business Cards for Sale. Both Sides May Have Custom Text!

Click Here to See The "Your Name Here" Spiral Business Card!

LINK To My Most Popular Business Cards!

Link to All my Rainbow Spiral Gifts... 

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LINK to the Space Travel Business Card! 

Link to My Main Store: Coffee Cups, Buttons, Beverage Coasters, T-Shirts, Stickers, Mousepads, Earrings, Necklaces, Ornaments...

https://www.zazzle.com/store/gregvan

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Link to Slogans Embroidered on Hats

Including: "Make America Greta Again"

https://www.zazzle.com/store/gregvan/products?qs=hats&dp=252974809612728418

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Link to All My Earrings

https://www.zazzle.com/store/gregvan/products?qs=Earrings&dp=252419314095518495

Music Video: The Ballad of Stormy D... a Protest Song about Trump's "Hush Money" Trial. Lyrics by Anonymous...

LINK: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mo3ioiCGSxM

He sits in a room of broken lives, (Chords: E, A)

Haunted by schemes and cheated wives.

Old and cold and mad as hell

He can sit and glare but cannot yell.

He folds himself into a shrunken pose

Too old and feeble to stop the doze.

He hates the judge and he hates the case

And he hates the rules that keep him in his place.

The fat, frumpy golfer is a weak old man

With weird fake hair and a deep fake tan.

He's desperate and angry and doesn't sleep well.

So he rants in the hall like a clanging bell.

He just wants love and approval and power,

But his style is dishonest and toxic and sour.

The despots and strongmen play him the fool.

They laugh and point at the Helsinki tool.

He lusts for his daughter, his wife's not a fan

Of the dishonest and repugnant bully, baby man.

So he sits alone in the cold as they repeat his lies,

In his baggy blue suit and his long long ties.

Smaller and smaller the old man appears,

Powerless and silent, steeped in fears.

His money and title and self made fame

Are now a poison, a poison with his name.

INTRO: I Played an "E" Chord and then Slid my Fingers UP one Fret to Play an "F" chord with the three untouched strings remaining E,B & E... This Causes Anxiety in the Listener... then a brief NO CHORD and They are Relieved when I Play the "E" Chord Again... Resolved!

Note the Lighting: 

It Makes my Face Difficult for a Computer to 

Process in a Facial Recognition Program...

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FREE Guitar Chart Shows Where the Notes are on the Piano and Guitar... Very Handy for Composition and Learning How to Play Songs. Plus: SOLARIND our Band

Print as Many Copies as You Like!

For Sale as a Postcard - Click Here

or...

16" X 12" POSTER!

SOLARWIND: Our Musical Group 

Analog Synthesizer Tips and Tricks. 

SOLARWIND… 
I was fascinated with playing electronic music and played with my friends (Ken, Mark and Leon) in Ken’s basement for 5 years on the weekends During the 1980's. I also had a setup in my living room and would invite guests. This was at the time of analog synths and the beginning of midi. My favorite instrument was the Korg Polysix… It had the ability to make those really astonishing outer space sounds… Modulated resonant filter sweeping… like Steve Miller, Edgar Winter or Doctor Who… The pitch of the note could be defined by the control voltage input on the rear panel… well, I had a Radio Shack “100 in One experimenters kit” and a bag of capacitors, resistors and light emitting diodes that I hooked up to generate an oscillating circuit… Absolutely no one else on the planet was making the noises that I made… similar, true, but my noises were unique… Since it was created using wires and SPRING CLIPS to connect the components, the resistance of each connection varied according to stress on the wires… for example: if I blew at the circuit, the music would change due to the pressure of the wind…

Much of the time when I played with my friends in the basement in Manassas, Virginia we had a home made laser lightshow going… My friend built this using an extremely slowly rotating mirror that had a little “house” built on it out of transparent “walls” and clear glue… The “house” was about 3/4 of an inch tall and caused interference patterns to be displayed on the ceiling… these took the appearance of galaxies or clouds that slowly changed. The speed was about One RPM. He had guests come over and bring their instruments… A trumpet player from the Redskins Football Team band was a memorable evening. In general, we played music that you would hear as a soundtrack for a motion picture… Incidental music or abstract jazz or “outer space whoosh whoosh”…..

I really got into samplers when I got a midi controlled 4 second monophonic machine. It could be controlled by the drum machine. My favorite sound was a pan pipe. I set up the sound so that the sampler could play it back very slowly giving a low pitch. It sounded as if a giant was blowing on a pan pipe 20 feet tall… I made a tape and gave it to my friend “Major” Tom (a Bowie fan). He was very happy with it because when it was played on the car stereo, it put his children to sleep… Unfortunately, also on that tape were some doppler effect noises and he panicked because he thought it was a police car siren. A moment of fear but it was quickly resolved by erasing that part from the tape…

Leon had a black box that allowed me to sing or talk into the synthesizer and the volume of my voice determined the sound of the synth… You can hear this particular technique on THE DOORS- STRANGE DAYS… Listen carefully and when Jim Morrison sings the words “Strange Days have found us…etc” there are squiggly noises that follow along with the vocals… (amplitude to control voltage converter, also pitch to control voltage)

One of my favorite synthesizer performances was when I took a battery powered analog synthesizer [SH-101] to the banks of the Potomac River in Alexandria, VA in the middle of the night and made "spaceship taking off" sounds...  I was right across the river from DARPA and my goal was to FREAK THEM OUT. DARPA is the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and they are most famous for inventing The Internet. They also invented Agent Orange and that was pure EVIL but... you can't win them all. I had battery powered speakers and I made a really loud noise... might have been audible at the Lincoln Memorial... The basic idea behind "Spaceship" sounds is to turn the resonance of a band pass filter all the way up. That causes a sine wave with the frequency determined by the center point of the filter. Analog synthesizers have a Modulator that changes that center point. The note selected on the keyboard also determines the pitch... You have probably heard this sound on the Beach Boys song "Good Vibrations" oooh ooohhh oooh oh oh... Or Emerson, Lake and Palmer [the ending to "Lucky Man"]. Steve Miller... "Fly Like an Eagle"...

I also had a display of 18 strands of Christmas tree lights that would blink on and off… they were hung in the corner of the room with a mylar mirror on each wall… That provided enough light to be able to see the controls and keys on the keyboards… Each strand of lights would be either on or off and they all had different timing cycles… this made the whole display appear to experience waves of rainbow colors… The keyboards were all interconnected to allow waves of sound to evolve over time as the modulated filters ebbed with tidal forces…

Fun, but all those analog synths are hard to find anymore… they were replaced with digital ones that were cheaper to produce and more reliable… somehow there was a move towards realistic instrument sounds instead of outer space whoosh whoosh… too bad…

I remember Emerson, Lake and Palmer in concert at the Winterland in San Francisco… Keith jumped off the stage and wandered around the dance floor “zapping” people with a ribbon controller that was making “ray-gun” sounds… A good example of the ribbon controller was on “Good Vibrations” by the Beach Boys… the part that goes oooWWWWEEEwooowooo… ooooWWWWEEEwooowooo…

Another beautiful synth was bought used at a yard sale for 75 dollars. It was a minikorg and had been thru severe abuse on the road. This marvel is most famous as the lead voice on Kitaro records… the breathy flute sound that he uses to play melody parts… The theme to Silk Road, etc… This was a monophonic synth that had ring modulator effects and white noise… this also had a switch for setting the pitch to an extremely low tone… as if you were playing notes on a piano that were way off the end of the left hand… this machine allowed me to create what I called the “Dawn of Time” sound… A growling bass note that needed about 10 seconds to play… A ring modulator lets each key have its own vibrato rate… for example” “C” might have a wow wow wow sound that shanged every half a second while “C#” would have a wow wow wow that changed 42 times a second… “D would be 6 times a second etc… this tonal quality creates many of the more avant garde (or teeth gratingly irritating) sounds of extremely early synth recordings…

I also became fascinated by the possibilities of echo and computer controlled music. Lucky for me, instruments started being built with a MIDI interface… this caused older instruments to go on sale at extremely cheap prices…

The Roland microcomposer was 8 1/2 by 11 inches and had a microcomputer in it. I stored sequences of pitches and durations of notes using the tiny keyboard… really, really tiny… It was designed to drive two SH101 Roland synths and could play two notes simultaneously… what a breakthrough… from ONE NOTE at a time to two… By typing in a series of bass notes each with a duration of 1/8 of a bar… and then running it thru an echo box that had a time set to 3/16th of a bar… and setting the voltage controlled filter so that some notes were silent, some notes were muted and some notes were loud… I was able to trick the system into composing by itself a never repeating bassline that was fun to improvise over… the computer selected which notes to play and when… cosmic…
This worked well for music that is called MODAL… In that style, there are no chord changes at all… the performers select a handfull of notes as the scale and just go to it… the most famous modal piece is “The Old Washer Woman” and The theme performed by Edith Bunker on the television show “All in the Family”… The music is played entirely on the BLACK NOTES of the piano… I think they called it “Those Were The Days”… “Didn’t need no welfare state, everybody pulled his weight, gee those old La Salles ran great… THOSE were the DAAAAAYYYYSSSS…. It is an extremely simple song. So simple that I was able to teach a computer to play in that style… Of course, my compositions were not at all like that whiny song… more robotoc and like German Technopop…

Music nonstop, technopop… Bleep, blonk… tchatchink…
I was fortunate to have read an article in the Washington Post about the upcoming Kraftwerk concert so I went out and bought the recommended album Autobahn and liked it… The basic style of music sounded interesting and so, I went to the beautiful Warner Theatre to see them. This was an elegant performance space that started out as an ART DECO theatre and then became a dance hall for rock music… oh how lucky we were… This was my first exposure to the technopop music and many of the people in the audience were Germans… I had no idea that such music was even possible. The tour was to promote their albums Computerworld and Man Machine… They had two fellows that beat with “knitting needles” on touch sensitive drum machines while the other two played keyboard synthesizers… The drummers were wild because every time a knitting needle contacted the machine, a loud percussive sound happened… not drum sounds but more like boink or ping or even pffffbtt… When they performed their song “pocket calculator” they walked to the front of the stage and had members of the audience play the notes… The lyrics state ” by pushing down a special key it plays a little melody” blink bonk…. katrronk…. Quite an effective piece of showmanship and audience participation… Then at the end of the show , all the people left the stage and let the computers play the song… for about ten minutes… wild dancing to actual robot performers… I was amazed… Their website has a toy on it that lets you play a drum machine… boing, boom, tchack, peng, zonk… http://www.kraftwerk.com/

Another performance was outside a Mickey Hart Concert at George Washington University. A few hours before the show a group of Deadheads formed a drum circle on the street. I brought a set of Chamber Chimes and made tinkley sounds in time to the beat. Usually a Chamber Chime player keeps the wooden bar horizontal but I held it vertical sometime to cause a more focused clank-clank... I did not have a ticket to the show so I walked over to the White House and Lafayette Park... amazing the tourists...

I took my acoustic guitar to Lafayette Park often. One song that got a good reaction from the crowd was "Deal" by the Grateful Dead. After I was finished singing a man complemented me on my song about a DEER. I also played outdoors at Wolf Trap and sang "Me an Bobby McGee" with all the La-di-ye-has sung correctly at the end of the song... At Merriweather Post Pavilion at the Grateful Dead Concerts. I had a 12 string and was sitting on top of my car strumming away when a passerby said that it was the most beautiful sound he had EVER HEARD... about 15 minutes earlier he had heard Jerry Garcia... I was honored. He was probably tripping on acid...

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Lyrics to the song 'Global Economic Collapse' (bubble gum pop rock genre)

TEMPO=PEPPY. Chords: G, E, C

"The growth industry of the 90's...
will be subsistence farming...
when Reagan's rubber check bounces...
and global economic collapse...
rears its ugly head...
what will you do for food ?

OOOh, The winter gets cold...
when the arabs turn off the oil...
Your BMW will make a lovely planter...
growing beets in bucket seats...
open the sun roof wide...
scrounging in the city dump...
I seem to have lost my pride...

CHORUS:LET'S EAT RATS FOR LUNCH...
CHORUS: LETS EAT RATS FOR LUNCH...

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We made a demo recording and had an agent in New York try to sell it to people making corporate videos… No sale, but it was fun trying… When we recorded the demo, I loaned a huge pile of my equipment to Leon and he set up a special studio in the basement of his grandpas home. His grandpa was a Retired General in the Army and had a mansion in McLean and another in Arizona. I never met the grandpa because were were not allowed to visit when he was in town nor were we allowed in many parts of the mansion due to breakable oriental antiques. These people live in a truly different world than us peasants.

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In the 1990sI learned how to make rainbow spiral tie dye tshirts. I sold them out of my pizza driving car while I was working at Domino's. A person that ordered pizza was dying shirts in their garage and they explained how to twist up the shirt to create a spiral pattern. My finest creation was a bedsheet that had a rock band's logo on it. A local unknown band called "CandleOpera" had a logo formed out of three interlocking hearts. Two side by side with the pointy end down and one nestled between them pointing up. I used orange and red acrylic paint and dye to make a giant banner to be hung behind the band during performance. Then I dyed some unbleached muslin fabric and one of the girls cut it up to make dresses for the backup singers. The leader of the band wanted me to play keyboards but I declined... I guess I was too shy to be a rock star. They had one performance at a home in rural Maryland on the back porch. About a hundred people showed up and we got high in the backyard while the band played... then the police showed up and the party ended. While they played, they looked great! Years later I made a shirt for Victoria and It's one of her favorites.

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and then SE Said:

It really pisses me off that every time anyone posts something about San Francisco, like a beautiful photo of the Golden Gate Bridge or the Painted Ladies Victorian houses, there are always a bunch of comments from people saying that San Francisco has been "ruined" by the Democrats. It is so untrue, and it infuriates me that so many ignorant people buy into this false narrative being pushed by the right-wing media. I'm sure that the majority of people making those comments have never even BEEN to San Francisco. They're always in some other state, and they clearly have no idea what they're talking about, but they spew these lies over and over again as if they're some expert on the subject.
ALL large cities in the USA have homeless issues right now. It makes no difference if the city is run by Democrats or Republicans. The issue has to do with skyrocketing rent and housing prices, and it's happening EVERYWHERE. It is RIDICULOUS for people to act like San Francisco is some third-world war zone while a city run by Republicans is all shiny and perfect. Even if that were true, I'd still choose a city where the leaders care about protecting people's individual rights. I wouldn't want to live in a city where politicians are trying to control women's bodies,or trying to restrict people's access to healthcare. I want to live in a place where women have bodily autonomy and poor people have a safety net.
But back to San Francisco, this constant blather about it being "ruined" is the biggest load of crap. I grew up 40 miles from San Francisco, so San Francisco has been a huge part of my life even though I've never actually lived in SF. I've spent a huge amount of time there ever since I was a child, and I have a lifetime of memories in San Francisco, and I still go there every chance I get. As far as I've seen, nothing about it has changed other than the homeless community has grown in recent years...but this is true of EVERY large city in the country! The homeless community in San Jose has grown, too. If you live in a big city somewhere else in the USA, I'm sure the homeless community in your city has grown as well. It's NOT unique to San Francisco. San Francisco has NOT been "ruined." If you ever get a chance to visit San Francisco, I promise you will be awed by the beauty of the City and the views of the bay and the ocean. I also love the energy of the City. It has an energy that San Jose has always lacked, which is one of the main reasons I've spent so much time in SF over the years. I'm drawn to its energy.
People see what they want to see. If all you want to see in SF is the homeless issue, that's too bad for you that you've chosen not to see the beauty or feel the energy. But if people are going to focus on the negatives, I really wish they would quit singling out San Francisco as if it's the only place with anything negative about it. Maybe talk about the homeless problem as a whole, like, talk about how we AS A COUNTRY can fix the homeless situation IN EVERY BIG CITY, rather than sitting there going "Ha ha ha, San Francisco has been ruined by the Democrats" while ignoring the fact that it's a problem EVERYWHERE, not just in one city.

and I Replied: 

San Francisco is a Gem. It has delights That are Simply Not Available in the Red Neck South... For Example: State of the Art Techno Dance Halls... The Exploratorium Museum, Golden Gate Park, Gay Rights, High Tech Jobs... Boat rides on the bay... French Bread (while walking around Fisherman's wharf) - and my brother's house...

The Climate is mild... Not so bad as to be in danger from wild fires, floods, tornadoes or hail... IMPORTANT! Being safe is Essential during Climate Change...

and one time at a Grateful Dead Concert the French Bread had LSD in the Center Square... I didn't find out until an Hour Later when I realized that I was Tripping... and I had not eaten any Acid... Some Guy I met asked "Do You Want to Break Bread, Brother?" and...

San Francisco French Bread

Our Church is in San Francico. UUSF. and It is so excellent that Ram Dass Chose to have his Funeral There... With Wavy Gravy as the Master of Ceremonies and Bob Weir & Joan Baez Singing a Song... They Broadcast the Service Every Sunday online... and My Brother often Goes in Person... It's interesting to see him in the crowd shot of the Congregation... https://www.uusf.org/

Photographs of a Journey to the Headwaters Forest - Now a State Reserve... Near Eureka, CA - Plus The Story of How It Came To Be!

Photo of a Redwood on the way to The Headwaters Forest. It's an Old Growth Park with an excellent paved trail that's popular with people on wheels... Bicycles, Baby Buggies, Skateboards, Tricycles and Wheelchairs...

https://www.blm.gov/programs/national-conservation-lands/california/headwaters-forest-reserve

American History: MAXXAM - Charles Hurwitz and Michael Milken Junk Bonds... Earth First!

The 7,472-acre Headwaters Forest Reserve was established in 1999 after a decade-long grassroots effort to protect the world’s last unprotected, intact, old-growth redwood forest ecosystem. Several threatened species call the Reserve home, including coho salmon, the northern spotted owl, and the marbled murrelet. Deep in the heart of the Headwaters, old-growth forest is the beginnings or headwaters of the South Fork Elk River and Salmon Creek. This is how the area got its name. The Reserve is managed by the BLM in partnership with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.

There are two public trails in the Reserve. The Elk River Trail winds along the South Fork Elk River for 3 miles, followed by a 2-mile ascent to a short loop through an old-growth redwood forest. Interpretive signs along the first mile of trail describe the history of Falk, the historic company mill town once located along this section of trail.

To Get There: Drive North on Highway 101 and Turn Right at ELK RIVER ROAD Just before you get to Eureka. Travel a Couple of Miles Down That Road and Take Another Right at the Sign that says Headwaters Forest... Keep on Going Until You Get There...




Highway 101 Just South of Eureka
























There are Maps in the Quest Box for a Guided Tour of the Forest... A Ranger Built Educational Adventure...

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and Now for something Completely Different!

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A Free Concert in Old Town Eureka!
An unknown Tie Dye Artist...
Had these Shirts for sale...
































Samantha Toste - singer for Eureka CA Bands.
Vintage Soul and Blue Rhythm Revue.
Soon to Be Tim Day's Wife!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vX2utDYfzCY

Samantha Toste sings
"With a Little Help from my Friends"
Blue Rhythm Revue Band

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and Now for something Completely Different!

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American History: How the Headwaters Forest Came to Be:

https://www.multinationalmonitor.org/hyper/issues/1994/09/mm0994_07.html


Ravaging the Redwood: Charles Hurwitz, Michael Milken and the Costs of Greedby Ned Daly

The fate of the largest unprotected redwood forest in the world may now rest in the hands of an unlikely savior, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC).

Since the 1985 MAXXAM takeover of Pacific Lumber, the redwood ecosystem known as the Headwaters Forest, located in Humboldt County on California's North Coast, has been under siege. Lawsuits, direct action, legislative efforts and all other attempts at preservation have so far failed to curb MAXXAM's ravenous appetite for redwood lumber. Now many environmentalists and community activists are hoping the FDIC can stop the forest from falling victim to corporate greed. The federal agency may be able to acquire the redwood forest as partial or full payment for the $548 million outstanding claim against the United Financial Group (UFG), a holding company for United Savings Association of Texas (USAT), a failed savings and loan controlled by MAXXAM and its chief executive officer, Charles Hurwitz.

Hurwitz is not averse to transferring part of the Headwaters Forest to federal government control, but he is insisting on rather different terms than environmentalists are proposing. Ignoring the fact that a company he controls, UFG, owes $548 million to the government, he has asked the government to pay him $600 million cash for a small grove of redwoods; if the offer is refused, he has threatened to liquidate the forest.

"If the federal government does not purchase the Headwaters Forest, Pacific Lumber will go ahead with its timber operations," says MAXXAM's Director of Public Relations Scott Lamb.

A Wall Street Journal article said Hurwitz's proposal "brings new meaning to the term greenmail." Hurwitz paid approximately $900 million for the 196,000 acres owned by Pacific Lumber. If the government were to accept his proposal to buy 4,500 acres for $600 million, Hurwitz would earn a profit of more than 2,800 percent.

The people of California's North Coast know Charles Hurwitz and MAXXAM well enough to take his threat seriously. Twice in 1992, the company cut hundreds of trees in the old-growth grove of Owl Creek on holidays and weekends when state regulators were not working, in violation of the California Board of Forestry cutting regulations. Both times the cutting was eventually stopped by court injunction. Under current plans, MAXXAM will harvest all the remaining old-growth redwoods it owns within the next 14 years.

One of the last stands

The government's response to MAXXAM and Hurwitz's threat will determine the fate of a unique ecosystem.

Many trees in the Headwaters Forest are as old as 2000 years. The cornerstones of an old-growth ecosystem are species diversity and a continual recycling process interlocking life and death. After a 300- foot redwood falls, it serves as a nurse log to help new seedlings grow. The seedlings grow right out of the nurse log, which provides nutrients to the new trees as it decays. As the older tree falls, it creates one of the few canopy breaks in an otherwise shady forest floor. The nurse log lies basking in the sunlight, offering the new seedlings essential light as well as nutrients.

Logging, especially clearcutting, stops this ecological recycling process and seriously threatens the forest's ability to regenerate. When loggers remove cut trees, they also remove the nutrients that the trees would have returned to the soil. The soil itself will be lost after a rain because it no longer has trees holding it in place. As topsoil is depleted, desertification begins.

Though the redwood forests still support a diverse array of species, including California black bear, mountain lion, Pacific fisher and steelhead trout, logging is taking a severe toll on forest wildlife. Many rare and endangered species also call the redwoods of Humboldt County home, among them the northern spotted owl, marbled murrelet, pacific giant salamander, tailed frog and coho salmon. Their survival is dependent on a diverse and healthy old-growth forest.

Carl Ross, co-director of Save America's Forests, the nation's largest grassroots forest protection organization, says, "If we fail to protect these last stands of redwoods, we will lose one of the greatest wonders of the living world for all time. Less than 4 percent of native redwoods are still standing, and that tiny percentage is being hacked and cut for the last shred of money that can be sawed from their red roots. If we allow the extinction of these largest of all living things, we will be condemned as a society that knew the price of everything and the value of nothing."

Takeover plunder

The redwoods of Humboldt County may seem a long way from Houston, and United Savings Association of Texas, but whether the FDIC decides to pursue the connection may determine whether the Headwaters Forest survives.

There was little need to worry about the Headwaters Forest before Hurwitz's takeover of the Pacific Lumber Company. The family-run business was one of the most economically and environmentally sound timber companies in the United States. Pacific Lumber rarely if ever clearcut; it generally left standing 30 to 50 percent of the timber in a harvested area. This not only created natural canopy break for new growth, it also kept much of the soil stable, increasing the forests' growth potential.

The company was also generous to its employees. Pacific Lumber rented housing at below market rates to employees and maintained a "no layoff" policy despite downturns in the timber market. The company also funded a very generous pension fund.

Pacific Lumber's strength soon became its weakness, however. The pension fund was overfunded by $60 million, and, because of its sustainable cutting practices, the company held tremendous assets (old- growth redwoods) that could be liquidated quickly. Assessing Pacific Lumber in 1985, Charles Hurwitz decided it was ripe for a takeover, and he plucked it in the fall of that year.

Almost immediately after the takeover, Hurwitz raided the pension fund and doubled the rate of cutting to pay off the loans and junk bonds used to finance the takeover. If there was any doubt about Hurwitz's intentions and his dedication to preserving the sustainability of his new acquisition, it was cleared up in his first meeting with the workers of Pacific Lumber. Hurwitz was quoted by Time magazine as telling his new employees, "There is the story of the golden rule: he who has the gold rules."

Creative financing

The story of MAXXAM's takeover of Pacific Lumber is itself a tale of intrigue, shady dealings and questionable business practices. MAXXAM announced that it would make a cash tender offer for Pacific Lumber on September 30, 1985. Drexel, Burnham, Lambert structured the financing, which consisted of a $300 million short-term loan from the Irving Trust Company and $450 million dollars worth of junk bonds sold by Michael Milken's high-yield bond department at Drexel Burnham.

Shortly after MAXXAM made its offer, the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) initiated an investigation into the heavy volume of trading in Pacific Lumber stock which took place in the days before MAXXAM made its offer. A House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigation report states that the NYSE investigation uncovered significant evidence of insider trading and parking stock, although no civil or criminal actions were brought against MAXXAM or its associates for their activities related to MAXXAM's purchase of Pacific Lumber.

The NYSE investigation, the subcommittee's report and subsequent congressional hearings all make a strong case that stock parking took place. Parking stock is the practice of buying stock for another party in order to conceal the identity of the true or eventual owner. If Hurwitz had someone park stock for him, he could have accumulated Pacific Lumber stock anonymously and at a lower price than after the company was put "into play" (when it became known a single party was accumulating large blocks of the company's stock), which would drive the price of stock up almost immediately.

Boyd Jefferies, former chairperson of the Los Angeles brokerage firm Jeffries Group, Inc., who later pleaded guilty to parking stock for Ivan Boesky, accumulated 539,600 shares of Pacific Lumber stock and sold the shares on September 27 to MCO Holding Company, a Hurwitz-controlled enterprise. Presumably, this purchase gave Hurwitz enough stock to begin the hostile takeover of Pacific Lumber which he commenced three days after MCO purchased the stock.

Hurwitz and Jefferies both deny any prior agreement to park stock, but Energy and Commerce Committee Chair John Dingell, D-Michigan, and Representative Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, concluded in October 1987 that it was unlikely that the sale took place without a prior agreement, because the stock was sold well below the trading price on September 27, 1985. Since there had been so much trading before Hurwitz's offer, the stock price had already begun to rise. On September 27, Pacific Lumber was trading at close to $34 per share. In what was probably one of the more philanthropic stock sales ever seen on Wall Street, Jefferies sold the Pacific Lumber stock at $29.10 rather than its market trading price of $34. The discount sale was not attributable to a prior agreement, according to both parties, but apparently to the fact that Boyd Jefferies felt good-hearted that day.

Jefferies' generosity was not enough to ensure the financial stability of the newly acquired company. Though the interest payments on the junk bonds Hurwitz and MAXXAM used to finance the takeover were not due for four years, it was evident soon after the purchase of Pacific Lumber that it would be difficult to cover the debt. The annual interest payment on the junk bonds was more than the historical annual profit of Pacific Lumber.

To make the bonds more attractive to potential bidders, MAXXAM announced it would terminate the pension plan and sell most nontimber assets to pay the bank loan. MAXXAM also decided it would increase Pacific Lumber's timber cutting rate to pay off the junk bonds.

Getting to the pension fund required some slick maneuvering. According to William Bertain, a lawyer representing shareholders in Pacific Lumber and residents of Humboldt County in a suit against Pacific Lumber, the company attempted to protect the pension fund before Hurwitz's raid by declaring that the pension fund's excess $60 million would vest directly to the employees and retirees in the event of a hostile takeover.

Under pressure from a suit by MAXXAM, the Pacific Lumber board of directors agreed to a "friendly takeover," and MAXXAM agreed to defend the Board if it was found to have breached its fiduciary duty to the shareholders. MAXXAM increased its offer by $1.50 a share, for a total increase of approximately $33 million. But since it was now undertaking a friendly takeover, MAXXAM had access to the $60 million excess in the pension fund - so MAXXAM came out $27 million richer, despite the higher price paid.

Hurwitz was later sued by the U.S. Department of Labor and employees for investing Pacific Lumber's pension fund with the now-failed Executive Life Insurance Co. allegedly in return for Executive Life's junk bond financing of the Pacific Lumber takeover. The suit is still pending.

Failing Finances

Three years after MAXXAM's takeover of Pacific Lumber, another piece of Hurwitz's empire, United Savings Association of Texas, failed. The circumstances of the failure remain hazy. Although MAXXAM's Lamb claims that "USAT's decline can be attributed to a decline in the Texas real estate market," the S& L's deep involvement in Michael Milken's junk-bond schemes appears to have been an important factor in its downfall.

By the time USAT failed in 1988, Hurwitz had already gained the attention of regulators. In 1971, Hurwitz was sued by the Security and Exchange Commission for alleged stock manipulation, and charged by New York State regulators with looting Summit Insurance Company. Hurwitz was not found guilty in either case.

In the three years prior to its failure, USAT purchased more than $1.3 billion worth of junk bonds underwritten by Drexel Burnham. During those same years, the Milken group raised about $1.8 billion for Charles Hurwitz and his takeover ventures, including the takeover of Pacific Lumber, according to a FDIC lawsuit against Michael Milken.

The FDIC told the United Financial Group (UFG) that the company and its officers are liable for breach of fiduciary duty for wrongfully failing to maintain the net worth of a failed savings and loan. The FDIC also alleges that Hurwitz used USAT to aid Michael Milken's scheme to manipulate the junk bond market. And the FDIC accused UFG of wrongfully causing USAT to pay dividends to UFG.

At the time of the failure, MAXXAM owned approximately 22 percent of USAT and 28 percent of United Financial Group, the thrift's holding company. Charles Hurwitz was chair of both MAXXAM and UFG when USAT failed.

The questions of propriety surrounding the takeover of Pacific Lumber and the collapse of USAT may provide hope for the preservation of the Headwaters Forest, as Congress and environmentalists try to fashion a response to Hurwitz's demands.

One possibility is for the government to accede to the proposal for a $600 million cash buyout of the forest. The Headwaters Forest Act, introduced by Representative Dan Hamburg, D-California, would authorize the Department of Agriculture to buy 44,000 acres of the forest. Because of Congress's understandable reluctance to pay $600 million, the bill leaves the amount and method of payment open to negotiation between the Department of Agriculture and Hurwitz.

Hamburg's bill has passed the House of Representatives and Senator Barbara Boxer, D- California, has introduced a Senate version of Hamburg's bill, but it currently has no co-sponsors.

Another, bolder approach would avoid the need for Congress to directly or indirectly authorize funds for the purchase of the Headwaters Forest. Prodded by some environmentalists, Representative Ron Dellums, D-California, Chair of the House Banking Committee Henry Gonzales, D-Texas, and other members of the House have asked the FDIC to consider "disgorging" Pacific Lumber from MAXXAM, on the grounds that MAXXAM's takeover of Pacific Lumber was inextricably bound up with USAT's failure.

The case for disgorgement, Dellums wrote to FDIC Chairman Andrew Hove, "is based on the assessment that MAXXAM acquired Pacific Lumber as a direct result of certain alleged breaches of fiduciary duties owed United Savings Association of Texas (USAT) by MAXXAM, as controlling stockholder, and by similar alleged breaches of duty on the part of certain overlapping officers and directors." The letter explains, "These alleged breaches include causing USAT to invest heavily in junk bonds underwritten by Drexel, Burnham and Lambert as a quid pro quo for Drexel's underwriting of the bonds MAXXAM used to acquire Pacific Lumber."

Jill Ratner, a lawyer at the Oakland-based Rose Foundation was the first to look into the idea of disgorgement. According to Ratner, "We based our theory on the FDIC's own allegations in a related case. The FDIC's complaint in FDIC v. Milken alleged that Drexel, Burnham and Lambert and MAXXAM's CEO, Charles Hurwitz, arranged for the S& L [USAT] to purchase millions of dollars of Drexel's underwritten bonds in return for Drexel's securing the financing that allowed MAXXAM to buy out Pacific Lumber. In the end, these alleged interested insider transactions were very much to MAXXAM's advantage and very much to USAT's detriment."

In sum, Ratner says, "What we're saying is that if the FDIC can prove what it already alleged, MAXXAM should be made to surrender the profit it made on the allegedly improper financing deal, and that profit is Pacific Lumber."

The FDIC has responded to the calls for disgorgement by stating that it is still reviewing the matter, and that it has entered into an agreement with UFG and others who may be responsible for losses resulting from the failure. The parties have all agreed to hold off legal actions and negotiate toward a settlement.

Disgorgement would put the Headwaters into federal ownership, but many in the communities throughout Humboldt County would like to see Hurwitz pay for his actions with more than just trees. Darryl Cherney, an Earth First! activist in Garberville, California, has been working on this issue since MAXXAM took over Pacific Lumber. Cherney has a deep disgust for Hurwitz and his business practices. "Hurwitz has pilfered the Pacific Lumber pension fund, ripped off the redwoods, and swindled a savings and loan to do it. We say three strikes and you're out. The only thing that is up for negotiation as far as old growth redwoods are concerned is the length of Hurwitz's jail sentence."

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I was Raised an Atheist. My Grandfather was a Minister but during the 1930s he had a Crisis of Faith and Concluded that God Did Not Exist. No One was Putting any money in the Collection Plate. So, in order to feed his Family he Quit and Became a Math Teacher.

My Dad was Enthusiastic about Atheism. His Entire Life... I Was Not Real Excited one way or another. However, When I Took LSD I Had a Religious Experience. I Experienced True Enlightenment... For a Few Hours. That Experience made Traditional Religion Seem BOGUS... 

Moses Talking to A Burning Bush that Explained All the Secrets of Life? Been there, Done That, Got the Tie-Dye T-Shirt...

Portrait of God by gvan42

And then My Facebook Friends Commented...

PD: True enlightenment on LSD? OK

Gregory Laan Yes, That's What it Does... For a few Hours... and It DID Awaken an Interest in Attaining True Enlightenment Permanently...

MB: Beware! Drugs and Alcohol can bring forth the subconscious mind ,which is the dark side of man.

Gregory Laan Somehow, I Have Noticed that Corporate Greed Freaks are Generally People That Have NOT Had The LSD Experience...

TL:  Dr Andrew Weill wrote a book on the subconscious mind. called 'the Marriage of the Sun and the Moon' wherein he writes about his efforts, by way of experiencing varous methods of reaching and 'altered state', as practiced by indigenous people in South and Central America. The social and communal methods of what we might call 'getting high' were used to bring about social harmony in different cultures, and were part of their religion too. Dr Weill went to those places, experienced the affects of the local 'altered states' with the goal to achieve a subconscious awareness whenever you wanted to, in order to reach those parts of the mind that drive the creative side (dream like) part of the brain for the benefits of thinking, outside the box, so to speak. I can only say this is my interpretation of his efforts. Judge for yourself. Buy the book. Also research all you can on Dr Joseph Campbell, who was also interviewed by Bill Moyers and I believe available on Youtube. Learn about he development/evolvement of the human mindset from early man until present.

Gregory Laan I Ate Peyote and Mescalita Taught Me MY SONG and then We Sang it for the Whole Tribe. At The Rainbow Gathering in 1987 in Pennsylvania... Glad I Did That!

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So Many Different Gods... and So Many Believers Loudly Proclaim that THEIR God is the One True God. That's Absurd! I, like 100% of the people on Earth HAVE NO CLUE if God is real or not.

Some people state that they know... but they are just deluding themselves... I don't mind them deluding themselves, but if they Kill people that are of different Religions... They are Crazy and Dangerous.  

https://gvan42.blogspot.com/2018/04/i-accepted-jesus-as-my-personal-savior.html

Welcome to The Clergy Project https://clergyproject.org/

Are you a religious professional who no longer believes in the supernatural? Have you remained in vocational ministry, secretly hiding away your non-belief? Are you struggling over where to go from here with your life and career?

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So far no response to my doing AA Step Eleven... I did my part but God did nothing... Deep Sigh... Silly me, I expected to receive knowledge... or Hints... or Clues... But I got Nothing...

Step Eleven: "Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out."

If I read this step carefully I see that there is action required on my part [I pray for Knowledge] but nowhere in this step is there any action required on Gods part [No hint as to what his will for us is...] and I have been listening...

Silly me, I expected to receive knowledge... or Hints... or Clues... But I got Nothing...

I assume that the reason for a total lack of answers is that God does not exist. OR... maybe God does exist but always remains silent.  Either way, I am given total freedom of choice when it comes to my own behavior. God never takes any action no matter what I do or believe...  Whoo-hoo! I am free. So I choose to keep on doing what I was doing before... No new Ideas have wandered into my mind since I started practicing Step Eleven actively.

This makes me wonder why many different cultures invented the concept of God or Gods.
Indians in India have over a thousand different Gods... I guess that it is comforting to believe in a power greater than yourself... I really like the Aztec Gods... They have some really psychedelic paintings of what they look like. The main one is a feathered serpent that came down from the stars. It sounds like an Alien on a spaceship... They really liked building Pyramids. I wonder what the
goal was... In both Egypt and Mexico people built pyramids and yet, there is no clear use...


So, while I wait for God to do something, I'll continue to go to meetings and write blog posts... God, if you are reading this... wake up!

I read a book called "Journey to Awakening" by Ram Dass which gives simple instructions on How To Meditate but following his instructions revealed nothing. Oh well...

I suppose that the real reason that I'm having no progress on step eleven is that I should do the steps in NUMERICAL ORDER. I never really finished step one. That step requires that I believe that a higher power can restore myself to sanity. Nope, no higher power exists and so this imaginary higher power cannot do anything.

I do believe that the AA organization and having meetings does help me quit drinking. The power of peer pressure is valid. I chose to associate with other people that voluntarily select to not drink. We have meetings and tell each other that our lives are better without booze. This is a valid technique for me.

Bill Wilson created the Idea of AA during a 5 day long belladonna and henbane "cure". Both of those drugs are powerful hallucinogens. During his experience he saw a white light and met God personally. While I have never eaten belladonna or henbane I have eaten LSD and that does give the illusion of direct contact with God. Mr. Wilson's idea of forming a club where fellow alcoholics can meet and talk to each other is a great idea.  After AA was running for about 30 years Bill Wilson tried LSD. He was very enthusiastic about it initially as it would allow other members to have a religious experience. However he decided to not make any changes at all to the structure of AA. His belief was that the organization was working well and any change could make it stop functioning. Especially having millions of members taking the powerful hallucinogenic drug LSD.

Inca Sun God - drawing by gvan42

and Then After Listening to The Saturday Night Alive for the Global Peace Tribe Show...

I Had a Dream: 

We were walking towards the Entrance of the Los Gatos Library and there was a Thin Old Man dressed in a Small Bathing Suit ahead of Us. He pulled on the entrance to the Children's room and It was Locked... Disappointed, he turned around and I asked: "Are You Looking for the Man Who Works There?" He Said: "NO" and I Motioned towards the Main Entrance. We all Entered. He seemed lost so I asked: "Do you Need Help?" as I would ask any Lost Old Man... He Said: "NO" and then I asked again: "Can I Help You?" He said: "No. I'm Fine." and then we went on Our Own Ways. By That time it was Obvious to Me That he was Ram Dass and That it was a Rather "Heavy" encounter to Ask Ram Dass If I Could Help Him... a Meaningful Event... and I was Shaking... So we went downstairs and I went searching for a Book that I Has Started reading before (about Philosophy) - and on the same shelf was a large picture book of the Grateful Dead's Fare Ye Well Tour with four CDs (that were missing) and My friend asked me why I would want to check out that book and I said: "Too Look for Pictures of Myself." and then I woke up and Typed this Document... It's Best to Type it Up before I forget it... For Certain, I would have tried to help any Lost Old Man but It seems Important that I Offered Ram Dass Help in my dream. That's One Of His Main Teachings...

Pentagon or Pentagram? Visual Mantra -
Just Looking at this will cause inner peace -
Psychedelic Art by gvan42

Green Eight way Mandala - Like a Stop Sign but...
The Exact Opposite... Like a "GO" Sign Instead -
art by gvan42

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