With the passing of Swiss Chemist Albert Hoffman, the person who discovered the psychedelic drug widely known as acid, I immediately thought of another person who has helped move mankind forward with an explosion for thought expansion: Bill Hicks.

I’ve waxed philosophical on philosopher/standup comedian Bill Hicks many times in this blog, and I hope someone unfamiliar with his work has been turned on through my ramblings. Most people will be vaguely familiar with him through Tool.

Here’s a clip of Bill Hicks talking about LSD.

DEEEEEEP. No, feel it. Grok it man.

Though this post is under my name, I did not write it. I wish I had. This is written by Synthesis Weekly Contributer Bob Howard, to be published on Monday. I think your ear (or eyes) deserve to be bent for a second.
– S

Winter Soldier
By Bob Howard

War on Truth: In totalitarian countries, what people can say is controlled by the government. Here we have the flag-waving nationalistic “patriotic” mob and a complacent media casually conspiring to censor unpopular speech.

I am frustrated by the backlash levied against Senator Barack Obama’s pastor Reverend Jeremiah Wright for speaking truth. America is a country that was founded on racism. We came to this country, slaughtered and imprisoned the native population, then kidnapped people from Africa in order to do the dirty work. In this manner we accumulated more wealth and power than any nation in the world. It’s ugly but it is truth. We are still practicing imperialism under the code name “globalism.” We still pay dark-skinned people pennies per day to do the work Americans refuse.
Reverend Wright says we bought the events of 911 on ourselves. There is accuracy in that statement. Our foreign policy has serious flaws. Things are being done in our names of which we have only vague awareness. This is the crux of democracy. Unlike a monarchy or a dictatorship, America is meant to work as a “bottom-up” system of representation. We can’t shrug off the decisions of our leaders and claim we have nothing to do with them. We are the ones who put those people into a position of power and gave them the authority to represent us. So when our foreign policy is flawed it is valid for people to hold the American population accountable. Like it or not, that’s the responsibility that comes with a democratic system of power. As such our duty does not stop at the voting box. We need to carefully follow the actions of our leaders and take them to task when they act irresponsibly in our names.
I’m not ashamed of America – but there are shameful episodes throughout our history. If we ignore them or deny them we will never be able to reconcile them.

Winter Soldier: A phenomenal conference was recently held called “Winter Soldier.” The first winter soldier took place during the Vietnam War when soldiers came forward to tell of what they did and witnessed while serving. Atrocities were exposed. Now we have a similar coming out with hundreds of veterans of the Iraq War coming forward to describe their experiences. I’ve been following some of the testimony and it is horrifying. The most disturbing thing is the callousness of our military command. As in any war the enemy is framed as sub-human, and similar to Vietnam the drag-net term “enemy” is essentially expanded to include anyone we capture or kill. Soldiers testified of unloading hundreds of rounds into cars on the roads, being given order to take out any and all taxi cabs, and detaining Iraqi men even when they knew they were not the suspects they were looking for. It’s brutal, awful stuff. We can use all the clinical sounding terms we like: “enhanced interrogation,” “non-lawful combatant,” “counter-insurgency.” Terms obscure the bloody truth on the ground — the truth that we have invaded a country, killed hundreds of thousands of its citizens, and driven anyone with means out of the country. The truth is blood and body parts litter the streets and our soldiers are going to come back from this conflict all screwed up in their heads from killing civilians in a half-baked conflict dreamed up by ideologues in Washington DC.
How many times do we have to enter into the same follies before we rise up as a people and say “ENOUGH?” Obviously someone is benefiting from these impossible conflicts but it isn’t you and I. There is an oligarchy in place, a small powerful group of incredibly wealthy people who are cynically using nationalism, religion and racism to pit regular working people against one another. They are using fear to keep us complacent. Fear of war, fear of economic woe, fear of the other, the alien, the end. They keep our heads spinning so fast from one crisis to another that we never have the ability to unify and rise.

The Rising of the Moon: On Saint Patrick’s Day I sat on a barstool and drank Guinness with a woman from Northern Ireland. She talked about growing up in the sights of British guns. The Irish know how it feels to be on the receiving end of imperialism all too well. The Irish rose up.
It won’t happen of its own accord. If change is going to come about in this entrenched system that favors those who set it up, it is going to take activism on the part of the many. It is going to take awareness and a conscious spirit of social revolution.

Here’s to the rebels.

Revolutionary ideas? E-mail me at madbob@madbob.com.

[ed note: I added the pictures to Bob's piece without his consent. I take the Iraqi Rebel flag to mean rebellion against the occupation of Iraq, not in any way as an excuse or encouragement for Iraqi insurgents to harm our American soldiers fighting abroad. Also, the confederate design ties in well with the racism earlier mentioned in the piece. See, I'm kinda deep like that...man. It's a thin red line, I know... Either way, we need to GTFO of Iraq and begin to feed and then lead the world to harmony and unity so that we can unite as one human race and explore the universe in peace together, FOREVER. Special thanks as always to Bill Hicks.]

Motherfucking Bill Motherfucking Hicks.

First things first. If you don’t know who this man is, type the name”Bill Hicks” into YouTube. Then TURN OFF THE COMPUTER, GO TO THE NEAREST VIDEO STORE and RENT Sane Man, then BUY this:

This is what I fell asleep to (somehow) the night before setting off for SXSW. I did manage to fall asleep, but man, hard to do with Bill’s ranting brilliance. Raised in Houston, TX by conservative parents, he soon fostered one of the most brilliant minds in modern philosophy. But he used stand up comedy as the sugar coating. Totally brilliant. He’s coughing up a phlegm gem in heaven right now. Cause of Death? Not ironical, cancer. He was a heavy smoker. I’ll light one for Bill in a second, but in the meantime, watch this shit.

Oh, and did I mention, everything Bill said in the late ’80s/early ’90s eerily repeated itself over the last eight years. Talk about prophetic. That’s some staying power.

Among the many freebies at the SXSW Austin Convention Center, there’s one stand that towers over the others in terms of importances: free smokes care of American Spirit. Helping singers attain that delightful rasp and writers calm their fried nerves, American Spirit has been lacing up anyone who ventures onto the 2nd floor smoking patio.

They were certainly one of the highlights of my 2006 SXSW podcasts (available for your listening pleasure at Synthesis Radio. Hi Dain! Sweet plug, eh? Balls!), and are continuing to help me through my nights and make me feel like a coal miner in the morning. (I mean that in a good way.) After last night’s chain smoking mania I’ve switched to their Ultra Lights. Hopefully, less phlegm gems that way.

Did You Know: American Spirits don’t have preservatives, so it’s best to keep them in the fridge after you open a pack. I had no idea. Kinda makes sense, but honestly, I don’t see myself crowding my condiments with cigarette packs.

Did You Know: You shouldn’t pack your pack. They come pre-packed, so by tapping the box it’s actually going to make the stick harder to light. Did not know that, but I suck at packing my smokes anyway. They also have 25% more tobacco than other “king sized cigarettes.”

Did You Know: They are the only American cigarette that has “no chemicals,” as they say. (Fishy. Isn’t nicotine technically a chemical? Any chemists out there please set me straight if I’m wrong on this.)

Did You Know: Smoking is still really shitty for you. No way around that. But at least here at SXSW, that cancer is free and they’ll give you two packs if you talk them up, four if you mention that you’re about to blog about them…

Here’s to slow, delicious suicide:

“You know all that money we spend on nuclear weapons and defense each year, trillions of dollars, correct? Instead — just play with this — if we spent that money feeding and clothing the poor of the world — and it would pay for it many times over, not one human being excluded — we can explore space together, both inner and outer, forever in peace.”
- Bill Hicks

God Bless Bill Hicks

Space Shuttle Endeavor had a successful launch last night and is currently somewhere between earth and sky on its mission to the International Space Station.

On board is Barbara Morgan, the teacher who was the backup for Christa McAuliffe, who was lost with the rest of the Challenger crew in 1986.

The Endeavor hasn’t flown since before the tragic Columbia disaster in 2003. Their mission is to install a gyroscope on the space station so that it doesn’t have to use fuel to fire rockets to maneuver itself correctly (or something like that). There will be three space walks, the use of a robot arm, and all other sorts of rad things that you used to want to do when you were in 4th grade.

Now all I want to do is sit around and celebrate by watching videos of The Final Countdown over and over. This version in particular: