Dojo Rat

Assisted Opening Knives Still Legal

2009-07-17T08:48:00.000-07:00

Many of you out there may not know, but U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) had attempted to change knife laws to include assisted-opening knives in the illegal class with switchblades. This would have included any knife with a thumb-stud or other feature that allowed the operator to open the blade one-handed.
This release from the NRA tells us that Two Republican and one Democratic Senator authored an amendment to "The Federal Switchblade Act", which passed.
The press release states:

"The measure would exempt assisted-opening knives that can only be opened with "exertion applied to the blade by hand, wrist or arm" from a federal law that criminalizes commerce in switchblades. Assisted opening knives are highly desired by hunters, anglers, farmers, ranchers, firefighters, law enforcement and emergency personnel and others who may need to open a knife with only one hand".

It's a slippery slope, folks...

Tip of the hat to James Keating at MAAJAK

Assassination Update

2009-07-17T07:18:00.000-07:00

Well, it appears my hunch may have been right. It is being reported in The Washington Post and expanded on in TPM and Raw Story that Cheney cleared the CIA assassination squads to operate anywhere, including in the United States, something that is clearly illegal.
What is confusing is that it is also being reported that Cheney was running a secret operation that neither the CIA Director or Congress knew about.
We will have to wait and see exactly what that was, as it appears we may have some sizzling hot Senate hearings to get to the bottom of this.
As Raw Story reports, the last documented case of CIA complicity in assassination on U.S. soil occured in 1976:

"on Sept. 21, 1976, Orlando Letelier, a leftist Chilean political figure-turned Washington, D.C.-based, anti-Pinochet activist, was assassinated in D.C. by a car bomb. The act of terrorism also claimed the life of his assistant, Ronni Moffitt.
The FBI would later determine that Michael Townley, a former CIA asset, organized the assassination, aided by a visa provided by Robert White, then U.S. ambassador to Paraguay. The hit was discovered to be part of Operation Condor, a program coordinated by South American governments which sought to eliminate leftist political figures".

You can bet there were others.

Todays Intel Report: Corpse-Eating Killer Robots

2009-07-15T08:11:00.000-07:00

"Because Television News Sucks So Bad"

Let's take a quick look at a few of the goodies in the news that aught to scare the shit out of us:
1. Bush-era spying may have been blackmailing Democrats
The secret spy program may have been why the Dems appeared so spineless against Darth Cheney; it has been revealed that both former President Bill Clinton and Rep. Jane Harman were among those wiretapped. In Clinton's case it has been passed off as a one-time accident. In Harman's case, far more serious, the wiretap suggests that she was cutting deals with people connected to an Israeli spy ring in Washinton.
The fact she may have negotiated a "go easy" case on the spy ring shows how powerful the Israeli lobby is in the U.S. Government. The fact that Harman, Clinton and you and me were spied on by our own government should really piss you off. And you know it goes way deeper than this.
2. The CIA Put $400 Million Into Instigating A Revolution In Iran
Democracy, Schmoceracy. Sure, we overthrew Iran in 1953, (and now tried again, after the current election) but we are clearly still involved in various "color revolutions" all around the world. Dangerous stuff, considering it blew back on us when WE CREATED THE TALIBAN to fight the Russians...
3. Dick Cheney Ran Assassination Squads Without Knowledge Of CIA Or Congress
Oh Duh. Still more proof that Bush was a puppet.
But here's the kicker: Bush had already informed Congress in 2001 about a program to kill AlQueda leaders, which has been ongoing. It was actually something else.
So what the hell was this alternative program run by Cheney, which was so abhorrent that it stunned Congress when current CIA Director Panetta exposed it?
Let's see; How about the CIA killing people in the United States, against their charter? How about revealing the existance of Space-based laser platforms? How about killing people who knew there was a cover-up regarding the events of 9-11?
4. Military Developing Corpse-Eating Robots
"R2, Speak to me, R2!"
Yes, soon C3po will be equipped with weapons and a fuel burner that can process grass, wood, dead (or live?) animal and HUMAN corpses, which would be plentiful on the battlefield. Real Zombie Wars. This should put a smile on the face of our favorite Zombie, Bobbe Edmonds at "Thick As Thieves"...

Yes, Chinese Swords CAN Cut

2009-07-14T07:21:00.000-07:00

Jose sent us a link to this video of Scott Rodell at the Huanuo sword factory. Here, he uses the "Jian" first, I love the rolling cut he uses -- then the bigger and heavier "Dao". Here is the link to his website at The Great River Taoist Center.

Rick also sent us this link to a cool Blog "The Wu Sword Project", their mission statement is "This site chronicles our project to find the best authentic dao (sabre), jian (sword) and qiang (spear) for traditional Wu Style Tai Chi Chuan".

Thanks guys!

Review: The Complete Taiji Dao

2009-07-13T07:48:00.000-07:00

Now here is a book that arrived on my desk at exactly the right time!
"The Complete Taiji Dao - The Art of the Chinese Saber" by Zhang Yun is the most complete book on swordsmanship that I have seen yet. At a hefty 429 pages, this comprehensive study of the Chinese Saber is my new study material as I prepare to go to a weekend-long Wudang saber seminar with our Taiji instructor Michael Gilman.
While I have had training in the Japanese sword in Aikido, the Chinese sword is still new to me. Unlike the "Jian", the more delicate double-edged sword most often seen in Taiji practice, the Dao or saber is a large single-edged blade handled with powerful slashing motions.
In "The Complete Dao", Zhang Yun provides us with his background, and then procedes to explore the history of this weapon from crude jade and bronze models to the beautiful "Yao Dao", or slender waistcoat swords of the Royalty. As implied, there are many types of Dao, from heavy chopping cleavers to longer and narrower Dao's such as the ones used in Taiji practice. Zhang Yun explains this type allows him to more readily project his Chi to the end of the sabre, and is more nimble. Most Dao's are used single-handed, but Yun also demonstrates with a beautiful double-handed model with a ring pommel. (I want one!)
Zhang Yun provides very clear photos of all form work in the book, something that is usually difficult to read and put into practice. As the saber and spear were both the soldier's battlefield weapons, the applications from the form are against an opponent with a spear. Further in the book, the application work against both a heavier chopping broadsword and the slender "Jian" sword are demonstrated.
For me, this book arrived at a time when my interest in learning the Chinese sword is really growing. The book explains in great detail how Taiji principles are extended to weapon use as well as how the Taiji Dao is unique and different than conventional broadsword use. This book will stay with my collection forever.

You can read more about "The Complete Dao" at this link for Blue Snake Books, along with hundreds of other martial arts titles, please check it out!

How Psychedelics Shaped The Internet And Our Future

2009-07-11T09:38:00.000-07:00

Fear not, Goody-Two-Shoes out there; this post will not send you to the street corner looking for Meth.
This is about our look at Brain activity regarding meditation, non-linear thinking and the search for higher consciousness.
From This article in the Huffington Post, Author Ryan Grim provides an adaptation of his book "This Is Your Country On Drugs: The Secret History Of Getting High In America".
Specifically, Grim details how some of the most important advances in science, medicine and technology have been influenced by the use of psychedelic drugs.
From the article, which centers around Apple computer and i-product founder Steve Jobs:

That Jobs used LSD and values the contribution it made to his thinking is far from unusual in the world of computer technology. Psychedelic drugs have influenced some of America's foremost computer scientists. The history of this connection is well documented in a number of books, the best probably being What the Dormouse Said: How the 60s Counterculture Shaped the Personal Computer, by New York Times technology reporter John Markoff.
Psychedelic drugs, Markoff argues, pushed the computer and Internet revolutions forward by showing folks that reality can be profoundly altered through unconventional, highly intuitive thinking. Douglas Engelbart is one example of a psychonaut who did just that: he helped invent the mouse. Apple's Jobs has said that Microsoft's Bill Gates, would "be a broader guy if he had dropped acid once." In a 1994 interview with Playboy, however, Gates coyly didn't deny having dosed as a young man.
(snip)
John Gilmore was the fifth employee at Sun Microsystems and registered the domain name Toad.com in 1987. A Burner and well-known psychonaut, he's certainly one of the mind-blown rich. Today a civil-liberties activist, he's perhaps best known for Gilmore's Law, his observation that "[t]he Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it." He told me that most of his colleagues in the sixties and seventies used psychedelic drugs. "What psychedelics taught me is that life is not rational. IBM was a very rational company," he said, explaining why the corporate behemoth was overtaken by upstarts such as Apple. Mark Pesce, the coinventor of virtual reality's coding language, VRML, and a dedicated Burner, agreed that there's some relationship between chemical mind expansion and advances in computer technology: "To a man and a woman, the people behind [virtual reality] were acidheads," he said.
(snip)
And perhaps in other scientific areas, too. According to Gilmore, the maverick surfer/chemist Kary Mullis, a well-known LSD enthusiast, told him that acid helped him develop the polymerase chain reaction, a crucial breakthrough for biochemistry. The advance won him the Nobel Prize in 1993. And according to reporter Alun Reese, Francis Crick, who discovered DNA along with James Watson, told friends that he first saw the double-helix structure while tripping on LSD.

(D.R.)-- LSD Guru Timothy Leary belived this too, that psychedelics trigger changes in DNA, causing the human species to actually evolve.
Now, I'm not advocating everybody go on out and get dosed, but this is an example of our look at non-linear thinking and the possibilities in spirituality and innate knowledge that we can achieve through mind expanding experiances.
By this, I mean to include prayer, contemplation, and meditation in non-dogmatic, non-religious framework.

Washington Post: Meditation "Grows" Your Brain

2009-07-10T08:36:00.000-07:00

Meditation Gives Brain a Charge, Study Finds

By Marc Kaufman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 3, 2005; Page A05

Brain research is beginning to produce concrete evidence for something that Buddhist practitioners of meditation have maintained for centuries: Mental discipline and meditative practice can change the workings of the brain and allow people to achieve different levels of awareness.
Those transformed states have traditionally been understood in transcendent terms, as something outside the world of physical measurement and objective evaluation. But over the past few years, researchers at the University of Wisconsin working with Tibetan monks have been able to translate those mental experiences into the scientific language of high-frequency gamma waves and brain synchrony, or coordination. And they have pinpointed the left prefrontal cortex, an area just behind the left forehead, as the place where brain activity associated with meditation is especially intense.
"What we found is that the longtime practitioners showed brain activation on a scale we have never seen before," said Richard Davidson, a neuroscientist at the university's new $10 million W.M. Keck Laboratory for Functional Brain Imaging and Behavior. "Their mental practice is having an effect on the brain in the same way golf or tennis practice will enhance performance." It demonstrates, he said, that the brain is capable of being trained and physically modified in ways few people can imagine.
(snip)
In previous studies, mental activities such as focus, memory, learning and consciousness were associated with the kind of enhanced neural coordination found in the monks. The intense gamma waves found in the monks have also been associated with knitting together disparate brain circuits, and so are connected to higher mental activity and heightened awareness, as well.
(snip)
Davidson concludes from the research that meditation not only changes the workings of the brain in the short term, but also quite possibly produces permanent changes. That finding, he said, is based on the fact that the monks had considerably more gamma wave activity than the control group even before they started meditating. A researcher at the University of Massachusetts, Jon Kabat-Zinn, came to a similar conclusion several years ago.
Researchers at Harvard and Princeton universities are now testing some of the same monks on different aspects of their meditation practice: their ability to visualize images and control their thinking. Davidson is also planning further research.
"What we found is that the trained mind, or brain, is physically different from the untrained one," he said. In time, "we'll be able to better understand the potential importance of this kind of mental training and increase the likelihood that it will be taken seriously."

(D.R.)- Still more evidence that meditation, prayer, and ancient Shamanic practices can now be proven to re-wire the brain and create a higher state of consciousness. I think this says a lot about seemingly slow, introspective internal arts such as Tai Chi Chuan...

LINK To Article

L.A. Riots: Footage Of Korean Gunfights Removed

2009-07-09T08:36:00.000-07:00

I find this very interesting;
On the heels of the last post on ethnic riots and streetfighting in China, I decided to assemble a parallel story about the Los Angeles riots in 1992.
If there is one convincing moment in recent American history that proves The Second Amendment Right to Keep and Bear Arms, it is the fight to save Koreatown.
Frustrated by the apparant lack of police protection, Korean storeowners took maters in their own hands and provided armed self-defense. There was clear video available which showed Korean snipers on the roofs of their stores, the cars and SUV's circled wagon-train-style around the perimeters.
Those videos, a few of which I had bookmarked over a year ago for future use, have been stripped from the web.

Above is a still picture I was able to print from the thumbnail of the original YouTube video I had saved long ago.
The video at the top of this post is one of two that still exist on both YouTube and Google video, the second being a longer version with scenes of looting and a news anchor. There was a video, which I can not find again, that merely showed emotional testimony about what happened and why the Koreans defended themselves in this way.
Now why would nearly every video of the Koreatown gunfights have been stripped from the web? The one from the still photo above was a 2008 YouTube post.
1. Are there still existing lawsuits against the Korean storeowners?
2. Is Koreatown simply trying to clean up the image of the armed battle and move on?
3. Is there government influence, such as a U.S. Attourney leaning on someone to remove the videos? Is the spectre of armed American citizens defending themselves just a little too much for the country as we enter The Second Republican Great Depression?

Hand-To-Hand Combat In Chinese City

2009-07-07T08:25:00.000-07:00

The above news report comes from CCTV, which I am guessing is an English version of State-run TV in China.
For those who don't know, ethnic trouble in China is at a recent all-time high. While the broadcast above appears to blame the ethnic minority Muslim Uighurs for instigating the violence, This BBC report provides contrary information:

Groups of ethnic Han Chinese have marched through the city of Urumqi carrying clubs and machetes, as tension grows between ethnic groups and police.
Security forces imposed a curfew and fired tear gas to disperse the crowds, who said they were angry at violence carried out by ethnic Muslim Uighurs.
Earlier, Uighur women had rallied against the arrest of more than 1,400 people over deadly clashes on Sunday.
The two sides blame each other for the outbreak of violence.

AT THE SCENE
Quentin Sommerville, Urumqi
There are many armed military police standing around, also a few remnants of those Han Chinese demonstrators, still people wandering around the city carrying poles and batons and some carrying knives.
There's a great air of trepidation here as to how this night will play out.
I wouldn't have thought today that I would have seen Uighur men and women acting so defiantly in the face of Han Chinese authority, but they did.
I wouldn't have thought that thousands of Han Chinese would be able to walk freely through a Chinese city and march and shout slogans.
Xinjiang is one of the most tightly-controlled parts of the country. Those controls seem to have slipped quite considerably.

Officials say 156 people - mostly ethnic Han Chinese - died in Sunday's violence. Uighur groups say many more have died, claiming 90% of the dead were Uighurs.
The unrest erupted when Uighur protesters attacked vehicles before turning on local Han Chinese and battling security forces in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang province.

****(D.R.)- The Chinese government has had trouble dealing with the Muslim Uighurs, and would surely like to put most of the blame on them. The Uighurs, however, are very much a minority that is dealing with a monolithic oppressive State machine.
This is a very dangerous situation...

The Education Of Wannabeebee

2009-07-06T07:12:00.001-07:00

Oh man, this just cracks me up;
I usually don't respond to cranks making off-the-wall comments about our videos, it just goes with the territory. But I just couldn't resist with this one by Wannabeebee on the video above:

Wannabeebee: I cut the beard boy
I try to cut the beard boy!
After the guy with the beardl lets your arm go boy!
You go home boy
Tail between the legs boy
Sheeet
Wannabeebee: One rear naked choke would suffice.
Saves all the moves doesnt it.

(Me): Not if your opponent is struggling to get out,
This drill teaches to adjust to the reactions of a resisting opponent, but then you're stuck in your Mom's basement playing video game fights you probably wouldn't get it.

Wannabeebee: Regards your comments about basements well we dont have them here and porn video games I leave to you.
Just remember to you watching to much porn removes energy for training

Wannabeebee: Shows how much knowledge you dont have of combat doesnt it.
First off people dont start out with a grab like that unless they are none fighters in which case there would be no point in
busting them up.
Apart from that the moves are ok.
Dude, believe me if I put on a rear naked choke the opponent would not get out.

And he keeps going...

Wannabeebee: Hmmm looks like you do have some knowledge of combat.
Well dont presume others dont.
Anyway nice video on your home page.
I think that would be better shown being practiced against a good boxer.
I am training one at the moment.
Fast hands

He's watching our other video's

Wannabeebee: Opponents can struggle all they want.
Rear naked choke applied rear naked choke is on.
Mom dont have one
Basement dont have one
Video games dont play them
Now we have that out of the way what is your base art?
Is this guys base art wing chun?

Wannabeebee: His base art is Bagua?
I dont know. I see some good moves. I see some nice stuff. I dont see it being applied to some experienced street fighter or street fighting applications.
Now I havent studied any chinese arts but I see some good stuff.
So I think I would like to study bagau.
No teachers here.

Wannabeebee: Back ground
Karate( not the watered down crap)
Boxing
Army (combat)
security.

Wannabeebee: hi
Neutralize With The Shutdown
I think you or the guy in the video is open to getting head butted with that shut down.
I think he needs to have his head down and looking through the top of the eyes then if a head butt comes the head butter will head butt his face.
You guys have some nice moves. Reality applications might not be present but I think with some adjustment what you have is good.
I would like to study/ practice bagau.
I am a 53 years old ex soldier.
Any suggestions?
No teachers in the UK, at least not where I live.

Note: his YouTube page says he is 29
(my response): Hi Wannabeebee:

We all have backgrounds in Kenpo or other Karate styles, but have moved into the Chinese Internal Arts, Tai Chi Chuan, Xingyi, Bagua.
The Kenpo still comes out. Lots of Western boxing also.

You cracked me up, so you made the Dojo Rat Blog today

July 4: Jack Nicholson On Individual Freedom

2009-07-04T08:20:00.000-07:00

Well, it looks like this clip is going to become a regular 4th of July feature here on Dojo Rat.
From the movie "Easy Rider", Jack Nicholson, Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda posit on the qualities of individual freedom and the free individual.
This clip is for the younger Ratlets out there, if you haven't seen "Easy Rider", you should rent it.
Believe me, I've lived this clip, in various incarnations...

Parting Wild Horse's Mane Application

2009-07-03T07:58:00.000-07:00

Here's a nice presentation of "Parting Wild Horse's Mane" by Michael at San Diego Fitness.
This is exactly the kind of work Tai Chi Chuan students need to do to understand what the hell they are practicing in their form. As we know, Tai Chi Chuan (Grand Ultimate Fist) was once considered the most sophisticated fighting art in China, with Dim Mak pressure-point striking, takedowns and weapons systems. Many masters were lost to war early last Century, and when State Communism adopted Tai Chi as a health program, they pretty much dropped the "Chuan", or "Fist". Hence the "New Agey" profile of much of Tai Chi today.
Here Michael utilizes a low arm-pass to set up a takedown, and the sequence at the end is worked off a hitting combination. We have used the exact same technique (with a different set-up) from the Xingyi system as taught by Tim Cartmell:

I think this shows how much these arts have in common.
On an aside, if I remember correctly, Michael in the first video was kind enough to be a designated driver and drop ol' Dojo Rat off at his hotel room after all the guys had dinner and (many) Beers following a Mike Martello seminar. Whew; that kept me from getting in trouble on the mean-streets of Seattle...

July: Cute Hippie Chick Of The Month

2009-07-01T08:27:00.000-07:00

Yes friends, it's July 1, and you know that means time for our regular feature "Cute Hippie Chick Of The Month".
This month, the death of the lovely Farrah Fawcett has been eclipsed by the freak show of the Jackson family picking at the bones of emaciated accused child molester Michael Jackson. Poor Farrah.
As the golden girl of the 1970's, posters of Farrah and her feathered hair graced the bedroom walls of millions of boys and young men around the world. But it wasn't just boys that fell in love with Farrah, it was Robots too:

Meet "Hector", the evil Robot on the spacebound research facility "Saturn 3". It seems Hector was programmed by a psychopath that had a thing for Farrah (well, who didn't?) and Feathered Farrah Flees with partner Kirk Douglas. So, in celebration of the life of Farrah Fawcett, here's a clip from "Saturn 3":

P.S. - Let Michael Jackson rot in peace. I'm sick of the circus already.

The Circle And The Trance

2009-06-30T08:40:00.001-07:00

Funny how things come "Full Circle"...
An article I read recently talked about medicinal opium poppy fields in Tasmania that were being raveged by stoned Wallabies, sheep and deer.

"We have a problem with wallabies entering poppy fields, getting as high as a kite and going around in circles. Then they crash. We see crop circles in the poppy industry from wallabies that are high," The Mercury newspaper quoted Ms Giddings as saying.
A manager for one of two Tasmanian companies licensed to take medicinal products from poppy straw said wildlife and livestock, including deer and sheep, that ate the poppies were known to "act weird".
"There have been many stories about sheep that have eaten some of the poppies after harvesting and they all walk around in circles," added Rick Rockliff, a field operations manager at Tasmanian Alkaloids".

Dong Hai Chuan, recognized as the founder of Baguazhang (Bagua, or eight-trigram palm) is said to have created the circle-walking fighting style. But walking the circle has a much more ancient origin - as Michael P. Garofalo writes:
"Tung Hai-Chuan (1813-1882) became a member of the Chuan Chen (Complete Truth) sect of Taoism. This sect was part of the Lung Men (Dragon Gate) school of Taoism which was originated by Chou Chang-Ch'uan. Interestingly enough, Chou also invented a method of meditation whereby the practitioner would walk in a circle and, wouldn't you know, this method was practiced by the Chuan Chen sect. Delving further into this Taoist connection, Professor K'ang Kuo Wu was able to find a section in the Taoist Canon which reads:
'A person's heart and mind are in chaos.
Concentration on one thing makes the mind pure.
If one aspires to reach the Tao, one should practice walking in a circle.'

Internal arts expert Bruce Frantzis explains here the trance-like aspect of Bagua circle walking:

Yet, circle walking was not just an Eastern practice; here's a picture of some Druids demonstrating a circle-walking ceremony at the Spring Equinox in London:

As well as the fantastic designs on the Plains of Nazca, often thought as of maps for space visitors, may have been huge walking labyrinths:

Classical labyrinth:

Circle walking also has uses in tool and engineering work, as in this hay press and the use of millstones:

Years ago, I read Fritz Capras "The Tao Of Physics". In one chapter, he shows a diagram of ancient Sufi dancing, which was composed of overlapping circles. next to it, he overlaid the patterns of the atomic structure, which was nearly identical:

In this way, modern physics is proving things that ancient shamanic practice realized at a very deep level embeded in the human psyche or the DNA itself, perhaps suggesting the existance of a "Unified Field Theory", or the interconnected-ness of all things...

Xingyi Seminar; And a New Camera!

2009-06-29T09:06:00.000-07:00

*

Well, I did survive the Xingyi seminar down at Jake Burroughs' Three Harmony Martial Arts Center this weekend. Above is a picture of me in the Xingyi "San Ti" posture from a couple of years ago. Jake has corrected several posture issues that I now see in my stance. I use this pic because I haven't completely figured out how to extract small clips and still photo's from my new Samsung video camera, below:

My wife snagged this camera for my birthday, and I had to have a kid from the video generation help me figure it out. It was very reasonably priced at about $230, and of course came with a new software that I am stumbling through right now. When I learn it better, I should be able to have better video production and all the bells and whistles. If anybody else has this camera and has suggestions, let me know.
--But back to the seminar:
Jake taught us two forms; the Horse, and the Tuo (which is variously refered to as the Water-skimmer or Aligator).
The Horse is a bold, agressive form as many Xingyi forms are. Horses rear up and hit with their hooves. In this way, the applications have two fist variations; one is with conventional fists; the other uses the knuckles of the fingers to "rap", like knocking on a door. This is the version I prefer. The knuckle rap is not for heavy knock-out hits; it is for attacking the opponent's hand metacarpals (back of hand/fist), pressure-points on arms, or bony areas on the skull etc.
Used in this way, the horse form attacks sting and numb the opponent's guard or draw blood above the eyes. They can be used in angles that a boxing punch can not.
-- The Tuo (water skimmer/alligator) moves in a zig-zag pattern and unlike the other Xingyi forms I have learned it does not turn back, it moves foward and moves backward. One arm is held high in a conventional block level, the other is low, palm out for groin slaps.
The Xingyi that Jake teaches is heavily influenced by master instructor Tim Cartmell, author of "Effortless combat Throws" and other titles. As you can imagine, the gap with the opponent is closed using the form applications described above, and then many options open up for throwing and sweeping the opponent.
After the seminar, Zac and I stayed for another hour with Jake, which included correction on other forms but focused on infighting skills. This begins at San Ti crossed-hands range, closes with slaps and strikes and goes to the takedown set-up. Then the partners re-set and the game begins again. This is done at a 70% speed, is non-cooperative for a sense of reality, but not done so aggresively that it is beyond the capability of learning speed.
Lots of fun, I'll keep working on my new video software, and maybe pull a few stills or clips.

***** For information on Chinese Martial Arts In Seattle, contact Jake Burroughs at Three Harmonies Martial Arts Center

Road Trip!

2009-06-27T10:29:00.000-07:00

Hey!
We're off to the mean-streets of Seattle for a Xingyi seminar. Lots of knockdowns and throwing. I hope to survive.
Updates to follow.

Direct Transmission Of Knowledge

2009-06-25T09:17:00.000-07:00

Our Friend, The Late Mike Martello

"Direct transmission offers all possible wavelengths of experiance because it is holographic and infinate in nature. It can be recieved intellectually, kinesthetically, of trancendentaly, through the channels of the mind or the heart or the soul, as well as through the primal instincts of physical body awareness".
-Spiritualist Suyra Ma

Jake and Dana at "Three Harmonies Martial Arts Center" in Seattle were kind enough to send me a few pics of our instructor and friend, the late Mike Martello. I thought the picture above represented what I view as "The Direct Transmission Of Knowledge".
At times, Mike loved to be the class clown and give everybody a good laugh, but when it came down to the nuts and bolts of understanding technique he was serious as hell.
I remember the exact moment this picture was taken; Mike was reminding me that a wristlock is not simply twisting a piece of meat, it is connecting to the center, to the entire body. He is demonstrating. He is making me understand intelectually. He is imprinting the moment in my mind, and he is making me feel the pain of a correct technique. This is direct transmission of knowledge, something no amount of reading or video surfing can accomplish.
Thank You, Mike.

More Bagua With Kent Howard

2009-06-23T08:40:00.000-07:00

I just love this guys stuff. This video with Kent Howard is strictly Bagua applications, in others he talks about the techniques and methods. Kent is a great example of a teacher that really teaches. I know of some internal art Masters that say "just do it for 30 years, and you'll get it". That might have been the way in China 100 years ago, but not today. I know Tai Chi Chuan students, for example that have never pushed hands or learned a single applicaton.
What I am really beginning to understand is that the Chinese Internal Arts work by developing "Shapes". These shapes are postures that show how to express power and stability in it's given form. Rather than being techniques themselves, the "Shapes" are archtypes or blueprints for techniques. This video of Kent demonstrating the "Whirlwind Palm" from the Wang Shujin Bagua system is a great example of translating "Shapes" into techniques, and watching him move helps me really understand my Bagua forms.

Epigenetics, Chi Cultivation, And Cellular Evolution

2009-06-21T09:24:00.000-07:00

I might be over my head on this one.
Last week, I learned about the term "Epigenetics", and spent the last two days reading scientific journals, even contacting a scientist in an attempt to get to the bottom of this. Look, I know next-to-nothing about Microbiology. To me, a science experiment is brewing Beer. Let's start with a scientific definition of "Epigenetics":
“An epigenetic trait is a stably inherited phenotype resulting from changes in a chromosome without alterations in the DNA sequence.” Shilatifard and colleagues have also proposed three categories of signals that operate in the establishment of a stably heritable epigenetic state. The first is a signal from the environment, the second is a responding signal in the cell that specifies the affected chromosomal location, and the third is a sustaining signal that perpetuates the chromatin change in subsequent generations." (link embedded)
--So what the hell does this mean?
The study of Epigenetics refers to how environmental influences can alter cell structure and DNA information that can be genetically inherited. This is to say, something you do, or something that happens to you, can be inserted into your very DNA and passed on to future generations. You can see the huge implications of this, and many scientists consider "Soft Inheritance" to be a slippery slope in scientific study.
All of the research I saw refered to the study of Epigenetics regarding inherited disease factors, such as Lupus, Autism or Cancer.
But what if self-introspective practices such as meditation or internal energy cultivation also cause genetic changes, perhaps that can be passed on to offspring?
In the groundbreaking book "The Aquarian Conspiracy; Personal and Social Transformation in Our Time", Marilyn Ferguson describes How meditative mind-body practices re-wire our brain and body: (pp 168-169)
"Inward attention, in other words, generates a larger fluction in the brain. In altered states of consciousness, fluctuations may reach a critical level, large enough to provoke the shift into a higher level of organization... Larger fluctuations of energy cannot be contained in the old structure. They set off ripples throughout the system, creating sudden new connections.. (this theory) helps to account for the dramatic effects sometimes seen in meditation, hypnosis, or guided imagery".
-- Now, what Ferguson refers to is a mechanical change in brain and body. What Epigenetics may suggest is that we may not be only re-wiring our Brain, but actually facilitating changes in cell structure and "soft inheritence" in DNA.
Eric Richards, PhD professor of biology in Washington University, St. Louis states:
"To get to the issue of the more extreme variations of soft inheritance, it has to be determined whether the environment can induce an epigenetic change in an organism that can be inherited in subsequent generations. Certainly, nobody has shown that an epigenetically induced beneficial or adaptive change has been inherited. Mechanistically, there is no reason to discount epigenetic inheritance. The biochemical nuts and bolts are there to support it. The big questions to resolve are how many epigenetic changes are induced by the environment, what types of phenotypes result from these changes, and how many of these epigenetic changes are inherited."
(link embedded)
--For further clairification I wrote Trevor Covert, editor of "Epigenetic News", with my questions about whether any studies questioned if practices such as meditation or internal energy cultivation could create positive Epigenetic changes. Here's his response:

Hi John,
Thanks for writing in with your question. I have not seen any scientific
studies on any epigenetic changes that might occur with meditation, etc.
However, there have been studies showing that DNA methylation patterns
change over a person's lifetime, as well as changes in methylation due to
dietary choices (i.e. There are some foods that have been shown to influence
changes in DNA methylation).
Some DNA methylation patterns have been shown to be correlated to a person's
susceptibility to cancer. Other diseases are also thought to be possibly
linked to DNA methylation, although few have been linked conclusively. This
is a very new field that is being studied aggressively so I expect that more
about what kind of changes in health/disease risk are linked to behaviors
and lifestyle choices will be uncovered in the coming years.
Thanks again for the question.
Cheers,
Trevor Covert
Faculty Research Associate
Washington State University
School of Molecular Biosciences
Pullman, WA 99164-4234

--So, as it seems, the research in this field is clearly looking at environmental influences that cause disease in the human body, perhaps passed on to future generations.
But, what if the opposite is also true?
For instance, in a metaphysical sense, could this explain something like generational Karma? Or what about "The Demon Seed"?
Studies have shown how the stress of big-city life with all the stimulation, electric fields and noise cause ill-health in it's residents. Perhaps an inherited neurosis?
What about introspective energy cultivation? Can it cause positive cellular changes that can also be passed on genetically?
Is this the next step of human evolution?

"We are stardust,
we are golden
we are billion-year-old carbon
And we've got to get ourselves back to the garden"--
- Joni Mitchell, "Woodstock"

Carradine; The Bowie Knife Fight

2009-06-18T08:11:00.000-07:00

Here's one hell-of-a knife fight, with the late David Carradine staring as Cole Younger. The movie was a revamp of the Jesse James/Cole Younger gang and was titled "The Long Riders"
The movie actually had four sets of actor/brothers in the cast, from Wiki:

The Keaches: Jesse James (James) and Frank James (Stacy)
The Carradines: Cole Younger (David), Jim Younger (Keith) and Bob Younger (Robert)
The Quaids: Ed Miller (Dennis) and Clell Miller (Randy)
The Guests: Charley Ford (Christopher) and Robert Ford (Nicholas)
It also features an uncredited appearance by Ever Carradine, daughter of Robert Carradine and niece to David and Keith Carradine.
******
It was a pretty good shoot-'em-up, damned near everybody gets killed.
The Bowie knife fight was really good, with Carradine as Cole Younger facing off against Cherokee Sam Starr, and of course Belle Starr instigating the fight.
-- Years ago I read a lengthy article about David Carradine in Playboy. It talked about him and Bob Dylan going to the same Kung Fu instructor in Hollywood. Perhaps the most interesting story, sandwiched between drug binges, was that of Carradine and the "wolf pit". It seems he was in some "B" western (like the one above) and the plot called for him to fight a wolf. Well, he got a hold of Dan Haggerty, who played Grizzly Adams. Haggerty had a small pack of wolf-dogs, and loaned them to Carradine. Carradine starved the wolves for two days before the shoot. On the day of the filming, He smeared dog food all over his body, and jumped into a pit with Haggerty's wolves. He actually got hurt pretty bad in that one, and Haggerty was pissed that his wolves had been misused.

Psychic Warriors

2009-06-17T09:16:00.000-07:00

"The Men Who Stare At Goats" by Jon Ronson

Well, for some reason the original post I did on this subject has disappeared into cyberspace, but I will try to rescue it and repost it here.
******
This week in Las Vegas there will be a meeting of psychic spies, a classified military unit that had mixed results but broadly expanded the role of metaphysics in the U.S. military.
The book above, "The Men Who Stare At Goats" refers to a lab where Army psychic soldiers attempted to kill goats with mind power, and author Ronson details many other tests and programs - some that included Martial Artists.
The Las Vegas meeting will be hosted by retired Col. John Alexander, who has mixed feelings about the new movie coming out that is based on the book, there is a link to Alexander's thoughts and more details at THIS LINK.
Another man involved in the project, Col. Jim Channon, was tasked out to go to Guru's, Hippie Communes, Martial Arts schools and other modes of esoterica to study technology that would allow the military to "think out of the box".
Here's part of an interview with Channon:

--I look foward to seeing the movie, which stars George Clooney, and it should be out soon. Here's the previous post I wrote on Ronson's book, as I said it has disappeared into cyberspace (interesting, eh?):
*******
The Men Who Stare At Goats

Pat over at Mokuren Dojo posted This Review of Richard Strozzi-Heckler's book "In Search Of The Warrior Spirit", a book I had reccomended because Aikido is part of the theme. As Pats review suggests, the book touches on the difficulty of an Aikido instructor's experiance teaching a group of Green Berets in a special military program. This program used sensitivity and bio-feedback in an attempt to create a super-soldier. Heckler obviously did not realize how deep the entire program went, which is detailed in Jon Ronson's "The Men Who Stare At Goats". Ronson gives the entire (unclassified) background of "The First Earth Battalion", which used Psychic Spies and other unorthodox warfare with mixed results. For instance, assassin training included developing photographic memories, to walk into a room and know at an instant where every pencil, chair, ashtray or other potential weapon lay, down to minute details. The title refers to a special lab, "The Goat Lab", where a large group of goats were kept. The subject would concentrate his psychic energy on one goat, and kill it while sitting in a room nearby. It is not exactly clear how well this worked, but Ronson's sources said at times it was performed successfully. You can see the obvious implications of this. Ronson travels across the country, interviewing people who were involved in the secret program, including martial artists that train assassins.
Now, most of us don't go for this Woo-Woo side of the martial arts, which borders on the occult. None-the-less, the military (and not just ours) is involved in this stuff. Here is a post from last January I did on "No Touch Knockouts" Which I have witnessed, performed by various Masters, with mixed results. There is a guy on YouTube who is offering thousands of dollars to anyone who can do one of these "no touch knockouts" to him, and I don't think he has had any takers.
The bottom line is, the U.S. military thinks this stuff may work, and has been involved in these types of training programs. I have read accounts of the Russians, who have been ahead of the Americans in all things Psychic, training their elite killers in this also.
Ronson's book opens a view into a dark world of Psuedo-science and the military-occult industrial complex. It takes up where Heckler's "In Search Of The Warrior's Spirit leaves off. "The Men Who Stare At Goats" is a quick read and is suprisingly humorous, considering the subject. It's also chock-full of martial artists that he interviews along the way.

Building The Saloon

2009-06-15T08:19:00.000-07:00

Barlow Trail Saloon, Oregon

Followers of the Dojo Rat Blog probably know that We've been building a Dodge City-type Cowboy Saloon up on the property. I mean, what guy wouldn't want his own Saloon; my wife has already bought me a keg cooler!

I showed my buddy Rocky a picture of a western Saloon similar to the old Barlow Trail Saloon above, and he drew up the materials list. I bought the lumber package at our local hardware store at a 10%-off sale, the cost was around $2500 bucks. Rocky built the whole damned thing in his head and put up with all our questions during the building process.

It took a day for me to excavate the building site, a day for us to lay out the footings, a day to pour the concrete, and two-or-three weekends to slam the building together. Man, it did take lots of Beer though! The exterior still needs trim work, more staining, handrails on the porch, gutters, a proper Saloon Sign etc. Then there's buying the insulation package, hanging the front door and starting on the interior.
This was a pretty low-budget but high quality building, and is kind of a dry-run for the cabin we are going to build soon.

And here's the start of our Summer party on Saturday night, it went on 'till 2am. I had our music stage all set up with lights and amplifiers but as soon as it got dark everyone gathered in the saloon for an acoustic music jam. We had two BBQ's going, the big smoker and a weber which the dogs managed to knock over late in the evening in an attempt to steal our salmon.
All-in-all, a very successful party! I'll be posting more pictures as the building goes together, as you can see - it's an ongoing project...

Kung Fu's Carradine: The Occult Connection

2009-06-11T10:44:00.001-07:00

The jury's still out on whether "Kung Fu" and "Kill Bill" star David Carradine killed himself, or had some help.
This website, however, has pieced together some intresting and disturbing connections between the Carradine family and Aleister Crowley's OTO Satanic cult, secret societies, and sex magick.
Take a look, if you dare...

* Hat tip to James Keating @ Maajak

50 Years Of Dojo Rat: More than you ever wanted to know

2009-06-09T07:39:00.000-07:00

Mama, don't let your babies grow up to be Dojo Rats...
Well, well, well... your ol' buddy Dojo Rat has finally hit the big 5-0. Believe me, I'm starting to feel 50, too. I heard once a man doesn't get wisdom until he is 40, and doesn't know how to use it until 50. Still waiting.
The above pic with my Dad was taken in November 1959, so I would have been about 6 months old. My mom said my first word was a sentence; "Turn out the light", and they haven't gotten me to shut up ever since.

In the fall of 1973 the young Ratlet started High School. One rainy afternoon, I opened the door to the gym and peered in. In the background a record player was echoing Elton John's "Tiny Dancer" while beautiful young women in tight leotards were doing gymnastics. Girls, with real breasts! "That's it", I said, "I'm joining the gymnastics team". The following year, when the seniors had graduated, I was the only one left that could do every event, so I became "all-around". Floor-ex was my specialty though, I was pretty good at handsprings and flips. Oh, but the girls...

Then there was the wrestling team. As you can see, the young Ratlet started at the 136-pound weight class. I put on a lot of muscle, and eventually wrestled 157 and occasionally 178. The coaches sit at the bottom of the picture. On the left is Mr. Austin, who was the coolest teacher in school. He wore tie-dye shirts and walked the halls playing a Banjo. On the right, the big dude in grey sweat pants is Mr. Nettles. One day in the cafeteria, I made the mistake of smarting off to Mr. Nettles. During wrestling practice that afternoon, he took me away from the team and into a seperate room with mats, and beat the shit out of me. I deserved every body slam he gave me, and figured I had learned my lesson. The next day, Mr. Johnsrud, a huge Norwegian-type guy that was not even a wrestling coach, came into practice in a wrestling uniform. He took me out of practice, into the side room and he beat the shit out of me too. They had double-teamed me. I love those guys...

I'm on the left, my best friend John Montague is on the right. We grew up together, shared everything; cars, guns, Beer, girls, more Beer.
Thats a shack we built and lived in up in the Coast Range of Oregon. We were deep, deep in the woods, hunting, fishing, drinking creek water every day. Every so-often we would hit town to stock up on rice, butter and alcohol, or drive to the University of Oregon to visit the girls we knew there. One night we were sitting around the campfire, reading books by lamplight. Up on the ridge above us, we heard a blood-curdling scream - just like a woman who was being stabbed to death - it was horrifying, and seemed to go on and on. Our dogs were freaking out, and we grabbed our rifles. We were so far back in the woods, nobody knew where our camp was, and it couldn't have been a person. I believe it may have been a Bigfoot, a Sasquatch - even cougar's don't sound like that.
We lost John in a logging accident several years later, he was pinned by a log and drowned. I'll miss him forever.

Here my friend Wes, on the right, is thrashing me in a stick fight. This was at the Farm in Oregon, on Sauvie Island between the Columbia and Willamette rivers. It was 300 acres of White Oaks and farm fields. I was caretaker there for over eight years, where I would plant corn, wheat and millet around the Duck hunting lakes the owners had. I grew a huge garden, we canned food and had chickens, turkeys, ducks and goats. We lived simple and free, and I learned a lot about farming.
Later, a super-multi-millionare bought the property, but kept me on as hired help. He started one of the largest Ostrich ranches in Oregon, and I worked there for another two years. Man, those Ostriches are dangerous, I almost got killed a couple of times. Sauvie Island was the first island I lived on, until I made the move north to my undisclosed remote island hideout in Washington.

Ace Hayes and I met in Portland in the mid-1980's. We became very close friends, and Ace was one of the most influential political Guru's in my life. He was a walking encyclopedia of government cover-ups and conspiracies. Ace had run guns to the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, worked as an activist, in prisons, and as a labor organizer. Ace ALWAYS had a 9mm Smith & Wesson handgun with him. We worked together on cable-access TV and published "The Portland Free Press". At that time, I was running a series on a CIA contract airline in McMinnville, Oregon. In the course of my research, I cultivated two CIA sources, and a third that threatened my life.
Ace ran informational seminars that attracted people from across the political spectrum; some were packin' guns, some were packin' pot pipes. He died of a brain aneryusm on a Friday the 13th in 1998.

I've had lots of dogs. Dogs that bit people. Dogs that killed things. Dogs that I'd have to bail out of Doggy Jail. But I have to say, this is the best dog I've ever owned. She's Border Collie-Blue Healer-Austrailian Shepherd. She stays around the property, goes to work with me every day, doesn't fight with other dogs, and is a pleasure to own. My dog has two rules for humans; sticks are to be thrown, balls are to be kicked soccer-style. You don't kick sticks or throw balls. That's it.

And this is my beautiful wife, the love of my life.
We finally decided "what the heck, we might as well get married" a few years ago. It was a full-blown backwoods Hippie wedding, 5 kegs of beer, countless cases of wine, and lots of really bad campfire music. There was probably around 200 people, and it went all night. I'm wearing an Elk-skin tunic that my Dad had made when I was about ten-years-old. My wife made her wedding dress out of a pair of Carhart bib overalls.
She is so beautiful, she's my best friend and partner for life. I'm one happy Dojo Rat!

And yes, this is me. Watch out kids; this is what 30 years of drinking Beer and practicing Martial Arts will get you - a crotchety old hippie who knows how to swing a shovel!
The rest of the story is filled in on the right side of the page, with pictures of my various instructors and training partners, who have inspired me, helped me grow, and given me the confidence to tackle life.
Damn, kinda makes me feel old...

This Months Tai Chi Chuan In Port Townsend

2009-06-08T08:07:00.001-07:00

Instructor Michael Gilman

It was another beautiful weekend to travel and visit our Tai Chi Chuan instructor, Michael Gilman. Port Townsend was in street-fair mode, celebrating the re-opening of a major bridge that brings in lots of Seattle visitors. There were at least three Bands playing in town, including one on a waterfront street where this picture was taken:

Several Beers Later...
*******

This weekend's workshop focused on elbow and shoulder strikes in Tai Chi Chuan, but before that we reviewed "Chan Su Jin", or Spiral energy. In the above picture, on the back wall you see a banner with three versions of the Yin-Yang symbol. We first visualized the top symbol, attempting to move our internal organs in the direction indicated in the symbol. Then the pattern was reversed in the second symbol, and you alternate between the two in a continuous loop. For those of you who read my review of the book "The Wellspring", we know that there are more nerve endings in our gut (The enteric system) than there are in our brain. For those with digestive problems, this may cure any ailments you experiance. The Enteric system operates seperate but in conjunction with messages from the brain, and it is often called "the second brain". You know, "gut feelings".
Next, we had a training partner put hand pressure on our stomach and small of back, so when we rotated our organs in the yin/yang pattern there was a little resistance for us to feel. I was paired up with our instructor Michael Gilman, who has very strong Chi. I felt that as he pressed on me and I rotated my gut, there was a powerful energy exchange between his palms and my center or Dantien. This went on for a couple of minutes, and when he released his palms from my body there was a powerful rush, like a drug coursing through my body. It was an almost trance-like experiance.
********

The remainder of the class was on the use of the shoulder and elbow. Elbow strikes are somewhat obvious and need little explanation. But shoulder strikes are underestimated in my opinion. Given the correct angles and positioning, there is a tremendous amout of knock-down power with shoulder strikes. Additionally, pulling the opponents face, nose or jaw into your shoulder causes lots of damage to the opponent, while you hardly feel anything. It's like slamming the opponent into a wall. The key is to use the three harmonies of range: hand and foot; knee and elbow; and shoulder/hip. The opponent will present us with an opportunity to use a particulear weapon at a certain range; you can't pound nails with a screwdriver...