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<div class="MsoNormal"><font size="3">Learned not to apologize for what I post from WMJ.</font></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><font size="3">Del Morrill just posted a YouTube of Kate Smith doing "God Bless America", which I cannot watch. If only for the reason of free press, I am grateful to be an American citizen, though the systemic communality in China is impressive.</font></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><font size="3">The following is in the July 4 edition of the Saipan Tribune. I lifted a lot from one of Gene Marshall's take on megalomania and civilization. I tailored it to my audience.</font></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><font size="3">Sending it to the listserv with the same caveat as other ones: if curious, welcome; not, see you at the bend. (Probably easier to digest than <b><i>Yes, we scan!</i></b></font></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><font size="3"><b><i><br>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><font size="3"><i>Jaime</i></font></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"><br>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">Patriotism</font></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">Francis Bellamy, a Baptist pastor in 1892 wrote: <i>I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the republic for which it stands,
one nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.</i></font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">He considered including <i>equality
</i>and <i>fraternity </i>into the Pledge but
knowing that equality for women and African Americans were still a majority
"no-no", he was more intent to get the state superintendents of
education in the Committee that approved the pledge, than he was in furthering
his political cause.</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">Upon acceptance, edited to read "my Flag and <i>to </i>the Republic", it was recited
for 30 years in American classrooms. In
1923, it was changed to "<i>the </i>Flag
<i>of the United States", </i>and a
year later, <i>"of America" </i>was
added to "the United States", until 1954, when to "one Nation
indivisible" was added the phrase <i>"under
God".</i> The United States
Congress started uttering the pledge in 1942.
The pledge has become a statement of patriotism.</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">Love of country has also become a staple serving of civilizations’
megalomaics. Alexander the Great who
started our social familiar is known as <i>Alexandro
Megos, </i>“megos” meaning “great”, with the word as the root of what is
observed as an obsession in the exercise of power, a mental delusion about
one’s power or importance, megalomania. </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">Alexander might be considered as one of competent greatness along
with the Caesars Julius and Augustus. Cleopatra
was a conniving female counterpart who orchestrated the killing of her less
competent brother so she could rule.</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">In our time, Mao Zedong, with his portrait gracing all current
renminbi bills, is considered in many quarters as a very competent megalomaniac
who united a disparate and desperate China from the ravages of rapacious
Western Civilization and westernizing Meiji Japan.</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">Though we grew up being partial to Pat Boone over Elvis Presley, we
were prejudiced against ‘tricky Dick’ Nixon who he is a better Republican than
his current counterparts. His megalomania
energized and brought him down. FDR was
a remarkable presence whose achievements in domestic reorganization and
successful waging of war deserve a place in the pantheon of exceptional
American citizens. His five terms in
office, comfort with power and wielding it, a talent for mobilizing population,
he may be counted among the successful “good kings” in the history of
civilization as opposed to the “bad kings” we like to label Caligula, Hitler,
Stalin and Idi Amin! Male or female, for
good or ill, famous wielders of power illustrate the personal mode we call
megalomania in a social ambience that encourages it we call “civilization.”</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">Ordinary members of a civilization honor this megalomania, identify
with it, and derive personal satisfaction in supporting it. Its face today is patriotism. It values competition over cooperation, with
power wielding preference to the male, female counterparts acting and dressing
up in definite masculine overtones. It
promotes social ladder climbing rather than encouraging an appropriate choice
of vocation.</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">There is megalomania in the passion for excessive wealth and in
achieving celebrity and notoriety of all kinds.
Civilization and megalomania go together. When there is a top-down social
stratification, megalomania resides at its core. While we claim to honor democracy, we
tolerate the Koch brothers’ influence on one side, and the mystique of Bill
Gates and Steve Jobs on the other.</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3">Our current political challenge is not to find another megalomaniac
of any variety from FDR to Obama who will save us, but to work together to
build something better than the socially stratified civilization of our
familiarity.</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align: none;text-autospace:none"><font size="3"><span style="font-family:">One of my heroes is recorded to have said: </span><i>You know that in
the world the recognized leaders rule over subjects, and great ones make others
feel the weight of authority. That is not the way with you: among you, whoever
wants to be great must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be
the willing slave of all. </i></font></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:Palatino;vertical-align: baseline"><font size="3">I once used the same image to illustrate my career choice in an
interview with a Saipan psychiatrist.
She saw the first part and ignored the second. I was reported to my ecclesiastical superior
as having megalomaniac tendencies! Self-reference to the "peons" of megalomania are always read as self-serving.</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:Palatino;vertical-align: baseline"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:Palatino;vertical-align: baseline"><font size="3">I was tickled but my Bishop was not amused. Megalomania after all is historically a
prerogative of the episcopacy. <i>Iesu</i> and his enlightened followers exemplified
a new kind of power, that of servanthood, and solidarity with others who allow
creative and democratic use of consciousness, talents, and opportunities
without resorting to the allure of megalomania.</font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:Palatino;vertical-align: baseline"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:Palatino;vertical-align: baseline"><font size="3">The Pledge will be widely repeated this Fourth of July in America. On the train ride to Chengdu this weekend, I
noticed the preservation of old structures with the cross in front, or on
steeples. Having foresworn the
institutional company of the followers of the Galilean carpenter, with their
unending edifice complexes, perhaps, it is time to influence the message
content within those structures. </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:Palatino;vertical-align: baseline"><font size="3"> </font></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family:Palatino;vertical-align: baseline"><font size="3">“One nation under God, indivisible” is the current reading of the
Pledge. That would be understood as the paramount
power of servanthood by the shores of Galilee.
I think I will be patriotic today!</font></span><span style="font-size:16.0pt; font-family:"></span></div>
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<div style="font-size: 18px; clear: both; "><a style="font:lighter 10px Verdana, Arial;color:#000000;"><img align="absmiddle" border="0" src="http://presence.mail.aol.com/mailsig/?sn=jrvergarajr2031"></a> <font color="black" size="2" face="arial">j'aime la vie
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<div><i><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#ff0000"><b>Yesterday, appreciate; tomorrow, anticipate; today, participate. In all, </b></font></i><i><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#ff0000"><b>Celebrate!</b></font></i></div>
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