Opinion: (Michael Khazin, an economist, from newizv.ru): “Neither the U.S. nor the EU can cope with the crisis. The U.S. are more tenacious than the EU not least because they have a stronger currency. The EU has already partially used its ability to print currency; they printed money in December, equivalent to one trillion USD. In addition, the EU has chosen a strategy that the American economist and Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz called suicide. And Stiglitz is a highly insightful person.

“The fact is that rather than supporting the demand, the EU starts tightening its belt. That is, it supports the banking system, but people have to tighten their belts. De facto thus the demand weakens even more. As a consequence, most likely, the European economy will start to collapse this year, and quite quickly. This may be partly glossed over by inflation, and recession will not be expressed so obviously. Even different statistical tricks may be used to understate inflation and represent growth, but the essence will not change.

“The Americans still have reserves. I think that they will hold out until summer and then begin the recession, following the simple logic, and that will allow Obama to be re-elected. Although this recession will be expressed only by inflation by the end of the year, yet they will still be at zero balance. However, we need to keep in mind that in contrast to Europe, the U.S. aggressively supports the demand.

“Obama has increased the budget deficit by more than one trillion USD a year, and this whole trillion went to support the demand, unlike Europe, where the same amount went to the banks. In this sense, if it were not for the increase of the budget deficit, the U.S. economy might have already fallen by 8-10% over the last 2-2.5 years.

“Here is the picture of the world: As long as the U.S. will support the demand, they will hold on, balancing at zero. Once the resources are exhausted, they will begin to fall. It will happen, most likely, a little later than in Europe.”

My Comment: Khazin is right, although we have always made mistakes in dates: The world was late all the time, finding new tricks not to manifest the crisis. I would push everything one half to one year forward. Besides, politicians have a game in store called the “international situation.”
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Question: Let’s suppose that I am used to working 8-9 hours a day and I get paid for overtime. My thoughts constantly revolved around my job, pride in my professional achievements, and my income. That was my world. I spent very little time at home. I was really with the family only on weekends and holidays. And then suddenly I was fired and deprived of all the routine that was in my life.

Answer: They revoked it because there is no more money left in the world. In other words, the whole world needs to let out the air from “the inflated balloon” and descend to the level of basic needs.

Let’s say we need to take care of 5 essential things: shelter, food, warmth, safety, and health. This is our mission, to supply this for everyone. There are many in Europe who saved all their lives for their retirement and were sure that in their old age they could live like everyone else, and in the end they barely find money for food and medicines.

So we need to show a person that he will receive a real bonus in return for his participation in the program of integral education that the society offers him. For example, society sends you to work for a three-hour shift and to five hours of classes at the university, and someone else is sent to the university for all eight hours.

As a result, we fill man’s day without touching the framework that he already had. He feels that he is occupied exactly like before. It is good for him to continue in the same vein. It doesn’t matter that the kind of tasks are different or that his many dreams and plans dissipated, he nonetheless sees that the same thing is happening all over the world. The troubles of the many are in themselves a partial consolation especially since he sees also no other options exist.

Accordingly, study and learning become an essential condition for providing his basic needs.

Question: A person who loses his job, doesn’t just lose the income. He loses his identity, his self-esteem, his social position, and friends. He is left isolated from society and feels as though “demons” have burst out of the bottle, opening inner doors within him that previously he didn’t even know existed.

Answer: To avoid this, we advise him to make an honorable living like others. But also, the moment he comes to study the integral education, he will immediately begin to understand his personal situation and the situation of the whole world, and this understanding will become a kind of prop for him.

Now man understands where he is and why everything is happening especially in this way. The education gives him a new vision, a new approach to the world. He becomes a real man (Adam – human/man) in the full sense of the word, educated and oriented toward what is happening. He is not detached from society, he maintains relationships with others, he participates in various activities, and ultimately thrives in society.

After all, a person who loses his job wants to understand himself, to restore himself. He lost his way and wants to clarify what is happening to him. When he sees that it is a part of the developmental process that operates on everyone, and not just him, that will already bring him some relief. Thus our materials need to provide a person with friendly and tender support, which will help lighten his spirits.
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From “Lessons About A New World” #1 12/1/11

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Opinion: (Andrew Burns, World Bank Manager of Global Macroeconomics from BBC News) “The World Bank has warned developing countries they need to be prepared for shocks as global economic growth slows.

“The organisation has slashed its growth forecasts, and is now predicting a 0.3% contraction for the eurozone in 2012.

“’Escalation of the crisis would spare no-one,” the report’s author warned.

Referring to the eurozone crisis and its potential to impact growth in rich and poor countries, Andrew Burns said:

“’Developed and developing-country growth rates could fall by as much or more than in 2008/09.’

“’The importance of contingency planning cannot be stressed enough…’

“The World Bank’s Global Economics Prospects report says that slower growth is already visible in global trade and commodity prices.

“It said that declining commodity prices were better news for the developing world, although food security for the poorest countries was still a major concern…

“’Developing countries need to evaluate their vulnerabilities and prepare for further shocks, while there is still time,’ said World Bank chief economist Justin Yifu Lin.”

My Comment: Wouldn’t it be better if they would bend their heads and look for new recipes for salvation. Kabbalah is offering.
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Opinion: (Vladimir Putin, Russian Prime Minister) “But speaking in a deeper, longer-term sense, we must admit that the current problems have nothing to do with market volatility. By and large, what the world is facing today is a systemic crisis, a tectonic process of global transformation….

“It should be said that the current global imbalances are on such a large scale that they cannot be dealt with within the framework of the existing system. It is true that market fluctuations can be overcome. Most countries have set out a range of tactical measures to respond to the acute manifestations of the crisis, with varying degrees of success. It is a visible manifestation of our transition to a new cultural, economic, technological and geopolitical era. The world is entering a period of turbulence, which will be prolonged and painful. We should not be under any illusions.”

My Comment: After diagnoses that we hear from everyone, there are no suggestions about the remedy, and the disease is advancing. We need to reach out to the leaders with our proposals. Although they sound a bit distant from reality, the same reality will finally force the leaders to review their opinions, and the sooner this takes places, the better it is for the world.
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In the whole world there are calls for social justice. We, on our part, should explain to people that it is impossible to enforce social justice artificially. A standard division of resources, like they do in social security, won’t help. For example, it is impossible to compare a millionaire who receives a thousand dollars for the third child with a poor family that receives one thousand dollars for the third child. Is this justice?

As Baal HaSulam explains, the measure of truth doesn’t allow us to attain justice. If you divide things equally among everyone, there will be no equality. So how can we solve this problem?

In order to do that, we need to be as one family. In the family there isn’t equality, but everyone receives his share because we treat everyone with love. When I love everyone, I can help one at the expense of another. Thus I operate according to the principle of mutual guarantee, and so I operate fairly. There is simply no other way.

This is what we have to gradually convey to people. After all, today society is more sensitive than ever to inequality, including sectors that not long ago were very far from that. In every country there are plenty of reasons for dissatisfaction, and the only way to succeed is to educate people about unity. According to the level of connection, people will come to social agreement about how to divide the resources, thanks to their sympathy for the sufferings of others.

Can you demand cheap housing for yourself when others have nothing to eat? After all, we have a common “pie,” which isn’t enough to supply all the demands. So if we don’t unite people into one family, we won’t reach anything.

Then we will be able to explain that the current evil is actually for the better: It enables us to correct ourselves and to advance towards the good. After all, thanks to mutual cooperation we will change and will start to share the resources the same way it is done in the family. Then we won’t need to turn to the government, which will not help with its imaginary crumbs anyway. There is only one solution: unity of the people.
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From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/17/12, “The Study of the Ten Sefirot”

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Opinion: (Mario Monti, Italian Prime Minister): “‘Italy, in order to develop economically and socially, needs Europe, and Europe to be stronger needs Italy,’ Monti said in a speech in the northern city of Reggio Emilia at a ceremony honoring the Italian flag.

“‘No European country is so strong to think it can go forward alone in facing the great global economies,’ he added. ‘It’s time for everyone to do their homework. No one can think they can do less than the others.’”

Comment: Do you have to be on the verge of bankruptcy to talk like that? Isn’t it possible in advance?
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In the News (from BBC News): “Dozens of people were hurt on Sunday, as demonstrators and riot police clashed for a second day running in the capital Bucharest.

“The rallies began in support of an official who quit in protest against health care reforms.

“But they have grown into a broader hostility towards government policies.

“More than 1,000 demonstrators rallied in University Square in the centre of Bucharest on Sunday, the scene of violence the night before. Demonstrators threw stones at riot police, who again responded by firing tear gas.

“Peaceful protests were reported in a number of towns and cities across the country on Sunday, including Cluj, Timisoara, Brasov and Arad, as demonstrators called for the resignation of the government and of President Traian Basescu.

“The protests follow cuts to salaries, benefits and higher taxes, but the unlikely catalyst was the resignation of popular health official Raed Arafat.”

My Comment: We will see such events more often in 2012 around the world. The protest will force governments to understand that the time has come, and instead of implementing “calming” measures, it is necessary to educate people and to actually change the structure of society from egoistic to integral, to a society of reasonable consumption.
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In the News (from Reuters): “More than one in 10 British-based scientists or doctors have witnessed colleagues intentionally altering or fabricating data during their research, according to a survey by the British Medical Journal (BMJ) on Thursday.

“The survey, which collated more than 2,700 responses, also found that 6 percent of scientists said they were aware of possible research misconduct at their institution that had not been properly investigated…

“High profile cases of misconduct have led many other countries, including the United States, Canada, Sweden, Norway and Poland, to create formal mechanisms for overseeing research integrity.”

My Comment: Since science admits everyone, not idealists, but anyone who is willing to sell scientific inventions and discoveries for money, honor, fame, wealth, and power, it’s not surprising that “scientists” adjust the results to the requirements in order to achieve something not in science but in their lives, for which science has become a way to reach wealth, power, and fame. This is the cause of the crisis in science, egoism, as everywhere and in everything….
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The spiritual vessels, the desires, can be “straight” and “round.” There is a similar division in our world too. The desire of the group is “straight,” because we work with it, assess and weigh it trying to reach equivalence with the upper Light.

All the other desires in the world, which are represented by other people, are “round” because they are not related to the “line,” (the limitation by the Masach, screen, and the work that is directed by the Light), and they simply want fulfillment.

Now a growing emptiness will be revealed in them. If we do our best to connect to one line, and on the other hand, we join the world as a circle, then people will feel how they receive a filling from the “pipe” that is formed by us. Then they will be drawn to us, will adhere to us like leeches, because they will feel that here is the source of life.

But in order to avoid a situation in which we would have the fulfillment that they couldn’t have which would result in their being filled with hate, the system of integral education must be opened to them immediately in order to explain to a person how to attain the fulfillment.

The Light cannot pass from us to others just like that. We must build a network of the right connections, and an education system is necessary for that. There won’t be any contact between us any other way.

It only seems as if the integral education is meant to simply connect people to one another. On the inside, however, it is the connection of the “pipe” that passes the Light into the “circle.”

In our group we are all equal, there are no differences between us, and we make up the same vessel into which the upper Light comes. But our vessel is in the form of a pipe; we work with the Masach and the Reforming Light. We try to adapt ourselves to the Light, to resemble the Light, and the desire and the intention to bestow is a kind of channel for the Light, a kind of a pipe, we become when we connect with the friends.

The external world is a “circle.” In order to create a connection among us through which the external world will begin to receive the inner fulfillment from us, there must be a certain degree of equivalence and we need an adaptor, a connector between us and them, so that we can connect.

This is possible only by education that we will provide the world with so that people will know how to connect the “circle” to the “straight line” in this world. Then, through this pipe, the method of the fulfillment will begin to seep, and the world will begin to organize itself to receive this fulfillment.
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From the 1^st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/8/12, Shamati #36

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Our whole process of evolution is through the environment. If there were no environment, I wouldn’t develop, despite the Reshimot (reminiscences) in me. We see that if children are left in the forest and are found only some time later, they develop like the animals that took care of them in the forest. They develop according to the traits of those animals, they suffer from the same illnesses they do, they think and want the same things the animals do, and even live the same lifespan of those animals.

This means that their body got used to living with animals to such an extent that they were impressed by these animals, so that if a child is found at the age of 6 or 9 (and there have been several such cases), then despite the treatment and good conditions they lived in afterwards, they lived the same number of years as the animals they had lived with. They lived 12 to 20 years at the most.

In other words, our body greatly depends on the society in which we develop, and in that sense a person is very flexible. If we take a dog or cat for example, who lived with man for ages, they only get used to people a little. Of course, they can’t live in the forest like wild dogs and cats, since they have a different character. They also pass on to their offspring a different attitude to man and the environment. Yet they are not that flexible. Man on the other hand, when incorporated in a certain environment, is impressed by it very strongly, even fatally. Compared to an animal that gets used to living with people, man is much more powerfully impressed and becomes accustomed to the lives of animals.

This means that we all depend on our environment. Therefore, in education, we should also first pay attention to the environment as a factor that determines a person’s development. A person’s whole future depends on this. If we change the environment, we change our personality, our desire, our perspective, and our paradigm of life. Therefore it is very important to be careful, to think, to check, and to consider the place we enter, the friends and the circles where we spend our time, and whom we give ourselves to.

We must teach a person to know and to learn what surrounds him, and explain to him how dependent he is on the environment and how he can manage his life by it.
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From “Lessons About a New World” #3, 12/29/11

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